Boning

Boning is the removal of bones from meat or fish, usually carried out before cooking to improve eating quality, portion control, and processing yield. In meat plants, skilled manual boning and automated deboning lines separate muscle from the skeleton while minimizing meat loss and bone-fragment contamination. The operation is a critical control point for physical hazards: bone chips and fragments must be detected and removed, and the exposed meat surfaces require strict temperature control and hygiene to limit microbial growth during this labour-intensive stage.