Wales’ world-famous lush pastures will proudly feature in a dynamic new taste trial to discern which diet can lift PGI Welsh Lamb’s taste from excellence to exemplar.
In the new year, hundreds of UK city-based consumers will try PGI Welsh Lamb from the fulsome fields of sixteen of Wales’ farms to reveal the taste impacts of different diets based including grass, fresh roots (like turnips) and brassicas (like Kale).
It’s all part of the Welsh Lamb Meat Quality project, which looks at factors that affect variation in meat quality, as part of Hybu Cig Cymru - Meat Promotion Wales’ (HCC) five-year, three-project, Red Meat Development Programme that seeks to help Welsh farming prepare for an increasingly competitive global marketplace.
Almost 500 consumers have already taken part in the first year of project tastings. HCC are planning that 500 more will feature in spring 2021 in the second set of taste tests in three UK cities.
Over the course of the project, nearly 2,000 consumers will help to accurately inform the PGI Welsh Lamb supply chain about eating quality preferences to help harness and hone shoppers’ taste and texture preferences.
“This next year in particular, we will be investigating the effect of the lambs’ diet on the nutritional quality of the meat and its taste and flavour,” said HCC Meat Quality Executive Dr Eleri Thomas, who leads the in-house taste programme team.
“We will be asking consumer panel volunteers to taste consistently cooked lamb samples sourced from across Wales and help discover which farming and processing practices help create the great taste of Welsh Lamb,” she said.
“Lambs finished on a wide range of different diets will be assessed. Additional measurements will be taken, including recording the lamb’s diet to reveal impacts on the resultant meat product taste and healthiness."
“Analysis of the first consumer data will be launched virtually on Monday 28 September this year with an exciting social media takeover. The day will include Welsh Lamb cookery and butchery demonstrations and will conclude with a webinar at 19:30 where the results of the first tastings will be revealed” said Dr Thomas.
The Welsh Lamb Meat Quality project is supported by the Welsh Government Rural Communities – Rural Development Programme 2014-2020 and funded by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development and the Welsh Government.