the library

Lamb

Meat, fish & cheese· meat

What it is

Lamb is the meat of young domestic sheep, Ovis aries.

What it tastes like

On the nose: umami, sweet, pure, fruity. Among its measured molecules: benzothiazole, carbon disulfide, 2,2,4,6,6-Pentamethylheptane, 3-octanone, 1-octanol.

Every one of its 18 compounds carries a paper the library can cite.

• octanalaromaaldehydereads as fruity (PubChem)Measured in 40 of 341 ingredients.cite

  21.02 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 56.59 ng/g by Day 9; paper's text names it fourth most abundant aldehyde in raw lamb, after hexanal, nonanal and heptanal — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row 'Octanal', Day 1 column)
• 1-octanolaromaalcoholreads as fresh orange rose (PubChem)Measured in 20 of 341 ingredients.cite

  23.55 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 57.27 ng/g by Day 9 — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row '1-Octanol', Day 1 column)
• L-serinetasteacidreads as sweetMeasured in 3 of 341 ingredients.cite

  7.06-38.33 mg/100g, the widest muscle-type spread of the six (ST more than fivefold LTL, P<0.001); no significant breed effect — Wang et al. 2024, Food Chemistry: X (Table 3, row 'Ser')Measurement only — the source text is licensed facts-only.
• L-aspartic acidtasteacidreads as sourMeasured in 9 of 341 ingredients.cite

  28.92-51.04 mg/100g, named third in the paper's own abundance ranking; no significant breed effect, but significantly higher in ST muscle than LTL (51.04 vs 28.92 mg/100g, P<0.001). One of the two classic umami-taste free amino acids — Wang et al. 2024, Food Chemistry: X (Table 3, row 'Asp')Measurement only — the source text is licensed facts-only.
• hexanalaromaaldehydereads as sharp, aldehyde (PubChem)Measured in 87 of 341 ingredients.cite

  163.20 ng/g at Day 1 (freshest sampling point); rises to 231.02 ng/g (Day 5) and 340.37 ng/g (Day 9) during refrigerated storage. Named in the abstract as one of the most dominant volatiles, and the paper's proposed hexanal-to-nonanal ratio shows a perfect Pearson correlation (r=1.00) with malondialdehyde oxidation over the storage window — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1 (volatile compounds, ng/g, raw lamb under air packaging), row 'Hexanal', Day 1 column)
• L-histidinetasteacidreads as sweetMeasured in 1 of 341 ingredients.cite

  second most abundant free amino acid named in the paper's own ranking, 37.22-46.59 mg/100g; no significant breed effect, but significantly higher in ST muscle than LTL (46.59 vs 37.22 mg/100g, P<0.001) — Wang et al. 2024, Food Chemistry: X (Table 3, row 'His')Measurement only — the source text is licensed facts-only.
• L-threoninetasteacidreads as sweetMeasured in 1 of 341 ingredients.cite

  the most abundant free amino acid in raw lamb muscle per the paper's own ranking, ranging 73.98-78.28 mg/100g; significantly higher in Hong breed than Hu (P<0.01) and in ST muscle than LTL (P<0.01) — Wang et al. 2024, Food Chemistry: X (Table 3 (free amino acid composition, mg/100g, raw muscle), row 'Thr', Breed and Muscle-type main-effect columns)Measurement only — the source text is licensed facts-only.
• L-argininetasteacidreads as bitterMeasured in 3 of 341 ingredients.cite

  28.30-47.74 mg/100g; no significant breed effect, but significantly higher in LTL muscle than ST (47.74 vs 28.30 mg/100g, P<0.001) -- the reverse muscle-type direction from aspartic acid, histidine and serine — Wang et al. 2024, Food Chemistry: X (Table 3, row 'Arg')Measurement only — the source text is licensed facts-only.
• carbon disulfidearomareads as when pure, carbon disulfide has sweetish aromatic similar to that of chloroform (PubChem)Measured in 2 of 341 ingredients.cite

  825.58 ng/g at Day 1, the single largest value in the entire table -- named in the abstract as one of the most dominant volatiles. Unlike the aldehydes and alcohols, its concentration falls sharply by Day 5 (125.31 ng/g) before partially recovering by Day 9 (376.24 ng/g), a non-monotonic pattern the paper reports without fully explaining — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row 'Carbon disulfide', Day 1 column)
• benzothiazolearomanitrogen compoundreads as similar to that of quinoline (PubChem)Measured in 1 of 341 ingredients.cite

  17.24 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 45.52 ng/g by Day 9; the paper's discussion connects benzothiazole-class compounds to Strecker degradation of sulfur amino acids (cysteine) during meat's own chemistry, though benzothiazole is also a known packaging/rubber-additive migrant, a possible alternate origin the paper does not rule out — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row 'Benzothiazole', Day 1 column)
• p-cymenearomaterpenoidMeasured in 42 of 341 ingredients.cite

  29.35 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 181.68 ng/g by Day 9 (roughly sixfold); named in the abstract as one of the most dominant volatiles — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row 'p-Cymene', Day 1 column)
• 1-hexanolaromaalcoholreads as fatty, fruity (PubChem)Measured in 50 of 341 ingredients.cite

  27.70 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 236.92 ng/g by Day 9 (roughly 8.5-fold increase, the largest relative rise of any compound in the table); named in the abstract as one of the most dominant volatiles — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row '1-Hexanol', Day 1 column)
• heptanalaromaaldehydereads as fatty taste (PubChem)Measured in 34 of 341 ingredients.cite

  36.64 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 60.94 ng/g by Day 9 (statistically significant storage-time change, P<0.05); paper's text names it third most abundant aldehyde in raw lamb — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row 'Heptanal', Day 1 column)
• 1-octen-3-olaromaalcoholMeasured in 38 of 341 ingredients.cite

  96.45 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 397.11 ng/g by Day 9; named in the abstract as one of the most dominant volatiles in raw lamb — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row '1-Octen-3-ol', Day 1 column)
• 2,2,4,6,6-PentamethylheptanearomaacidMeasured in 2 of 341 ingredients.cite

  171.27 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 435.97 ng/g by Day 9; named in the abstract as one of the most dominant volatiles, and the paper cites prior literature reporting the same compound in both raw cattle and raw lamb meat with a characteristic odour — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row '2,2,4,6,6-pentamethyl-heptane', Day 1 column)
• nonanalaromaaldehydereads as orange-rose (PubChem)Measured in 62 of 341 ingredients.cite

  80.98 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 97.52 ng/g by Day 9 (one of only three compounds, with hexanal and heptanal, showing a statistically significant storage-time change, P<0.05); the paper's text states nonanal is the second most abundant aldehyde in raw lamb after hexanal, and uses it as the denominator in its proposed freshness ratios — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row 'Nonanal', Day 1 column)
• L-glutamic acidtasteacidreads as umami, sourMeasured in 7 of 341 ingredients.cite

  18.92-28.86 mg/100g; no significant breed effect, but significantly higher in ST muscle than LTL (28.86 vs 18.92 mg/100g, P<0.001). The other classic umami-taste free amino acid alongside aspartic acid — Wang et al. 2024, Food Chemistry: X (Table 3, row 'Glu')Measurement only — the source text is licensed facts-only.
• 3-octanonearomaketonereads as fruity (PubChem)Measured in 8 of 341 ingredients.cite

  23.44 ng/g at Day 1, rising to 66.98 ng/g by Day 9 — Karabagias 2018, Foods (Table 1, row '3-Octanone', Day 1 column)