Abstract

  Spices and condiments are mostly used in dehydrated form which deliver environs that permits the survival of various foodborne pathogens. Total 150 samples (Packed and Unpacked) of 11 different spices and condiments were originating from five different areas of Faisalabad and were screened for the microbial quality attributes, based on plate count and specified identification techniques. They were studied for incidence of Bacillus cereus, C. perfringens, Salmonella spp. and yeast mold counts. It was concluded that 9 samples (6.00%) from total 150 were positive with Salmonella incidence. Black Pepper was with maximum reading (18.8%). This study reveals that incidence of B. cereus was (18.00%) out of total samples with maximum incidence samples of ginger powder (33.3%). As we are concerned by C. perfringens the total incidence was (10.66%) with maximum observation in Black pepper (27.2%). Maximum incidence of yeast and mold was observed in parsley chopped 5.24 log10 cfu g^-1 with all the samples positive with yeast and mold, turmeric and salt samples had yeast mold counts in tolerable limits. This study was conducted to determine the microbiological safety level of spices and condiments sold in the markets of Faisalabad city of Pakistan by dividing the city into five regions.

Keywords: Bacillus cereus; Pakistan; Salmonella

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Citation

Citation: Mujahid Hassan Khan., et al. “Assessing the Microbial Safety Status of Spices and Condiments Sold in Faisalabad City of Pakistan". Acta Scientific Microbiology 3.4 (2020): 233-238.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Mujahid Hassan Khan and Ayesha Kiran. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.