Development of probiotic beads similar to fish eggs

Abstract

Probiotic foods are mainly restricted to dairy and soy products. This study aimed to develop a new probiotic beads similar to fish eggs, commonly used in oriental cuisine. Beads were produced by the extrusion encapsulation technique with calcium alginate, added to one of the following cultures: Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG ATCC 53103 and Bifidobacterium animalis DN-173 010 and stored for 30 days at 4 °C. The beads were characterized by the size, weight, morphology and viability of the probiotic strains in different storage temperatures and in simulated gastric juice adjusted to different pH values. The beads were also evaluated by a sensorial affective hedonic scale. The beads present a 2.8 mm diameter and a weight of 0.01 g (p > 0.05). Free and encapsulated cells were tolerant to pH 3.0. At pH 2.5 only of the encapsulated cells presented counts above 6Log colony-forming units per gram (CFU/g). Beads containing L. rhamnosus showed higher viability 107 CFU/g in storage for 30 days under refrigeration. The beads may be stored at abusive temperature for 5 h without loss of viability cells. The probiotic product developed showed an 82.2% acceptability index of overall characteristics and good market potential as a new probiotic product.

Keywords

• Probiotics
• Lactic acid bacteria
• Beads
• Encapsulation
• Extrusion