Monitoring of starter culture-initiated liquid wheat and teff sourdough fermentations by selected ion flow tube-mass spectrometry.

BACKGROUND

Selected ion flow tube-mass spectrometry (SIFT-MS) is a direct-injection mass spectrometric technique that has been introduced recently into the field of food and flavor analysis. It also shows potential for use in the monitoring of food fermentations. Therefore, this study aimed at the online monitoring of different volatile compounds produced during starter culture-initiated liquid sourdough fermentations by SIFT-MS, for which a new workflow was developed.

RESULTS

The online monitoring of the volatile sample compounds acetoin and ethyl acetate, diacetyl, and ethanol was made possible during the production of sourdoughs obtained through fermentation with several interesting strains belonging to the species Lactobacillus crustorum, Lactobacillus fermentum, Lactobacillus hilgardii, Lactobacillus nagelii, Lactobacillus sakei, and Gluconobacter oxydans. Acetoin and ethyl acetate could not be distinguished based solely on SIFT-MS data. Diacetyl production was monitored in the case of Lb. crustorum LMG 23699 as a starter culture strain, thereby making the distinction between those volatiles produced in sourdough without extra ingredients added or after the addition of citrate or malate.

CONCLUSION

Starter culture-initiated liquid sourdough fermentations were monitored successfully. The volatile compound production of the different starter culture strains tested reflected differences in their metabolism and/or competitiveness in a sourdough matrix. © 2018 Society of Chemical Industry.