Premium
MICROBIOLOGICAL EVALUATION OF BLUE CRAB PROCESSING OPERATIONS
Author(s) -
Y B. RA,
WEBB N. B.,
SPECK M. L.
Publication year - 1976
Publication title -
journal of food science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.772
H-Index - 150
eISSN - 1750-3841
pISSN - 0022-1147
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2621.1976.tb00628.x
Subject(s) - vibrio parahaemolyticus , contamination , plate count , food science , shelf life , biology , environmental science , ecology , bacteria , genetics
Special and claw meat products from the blue crab produced in the commercial processing plants in North Carolina had relatively poor shelf life. These products had high initial total anaerobe and psychrotroph counts. Many of the samples were positive for presumptive Vibrio parahaemolyticus , even though many samples did not have coliforms (in 0.2g sample). The presence of presumptive V. parahaemolyticus and high numbers of aerobic plate counts, total anaerobes and psycbrotrophs in these samples was probably from improper cooking of the raw crabs and post‐heat‐treatment contamination of the cooked crabs. The results suggested that coliforms may not be suitable to indicate proper plant sanitation and product contamination. Crab meat produced under sanitary conditions had lower numbers of total anaerobes and psychrotrophs; these products had relatively long shelf life. The results of these studies indicated that to produce products having longer shelf life the commercial plants will have to adopt proper sanitary practices. The main objective will be to prevent post‐heat‐treatment contamination to reduce the initial bacterial load in the products, especially with the anaerobes and psychrotrophs.