The objective of this work was to compare two methods, one enzymatic and the other chromatographic using HPLC, for the determination of cholesterol in meat and milk. For the chromatographic method, a C18 column, 100 x 4.6mm, 4µm (Chromolith, Merck), was used, acetonitrile:isopropanol as the mobile phase (85:15 for samples of meat and 95:05 for samples of milk), a flow rate of 2mL/min and detection by UV-Visible at 210nm. In the enzymatic method, absorbance was read against the blank at 499nm, 90 minutes after the reaction. Each product was analyzed ten times with each methodology, the results being similar (p>0.01). The mean recovery was 95% for the meat samples and 97% for the milk samples with both methodologies. The results obtained for the meat standard reference material (SRM 1546, NIST) were similar to those declared on the certificate. The coefficients of variation for the milk samples were 0.81 and 0.82%, and for the meat samples, 2.3 and 2.9% for the chromatographic and enzymatic methods respectively. The enzymatic method was shown to be sensitive and precise, whilst, to the contrary, the chromatographic method required a rigorous control of the analytical conditions.
meat; milk; cholesterol; enzymatic method; HPLC
