A new simple method for microbiological sampling of meat surfaces

A new method for sampling meat surfaces using abrasive discs has been tested against the spray gun technique already described by Clark (1965). Evenly inoculated beef and pork slices were sampled after 1, 48, and 120 h of incubation at 4 °C for beef and 1, 48, and 72 h at 4 °C for pork. The new method was slightly less efficient than the spray gun in recovering bacteria during the early stages of incubation but was about 600% more efficient after 72 and 120 h.