Effects of starter culture inoculation on microbial community diversity and food safety of Chinese Cantonese sausages by high-throughput sequencing.

Effects of starter culture composed of Lactobacillus sakei, Pediococcus pentosaceus, Staphylococcus xylosus and Staphylococcus carnosus at the ratios (w/w) of 1:1:1:1 on bacterial community diversity and food safety of Chinese Cantonese sausages were demonstrated by high-throughput sequencing technology. At genus level, spoilage organisms and pathogenic bacteria such as Vibrio spp., Acinetobacter spp., Enterobacter spp., Yersinia spp. accounted for 54.13%, 10.01%, 6.94% and 5.35% of bacterial in the initial fermentation of spontaneous sausage, and the dominant bacteria of Lactobacillus spp. reached 84.61% on day 20. Accordingly, the total proportion of Pediococcus spp., Lactobacillus spp. and Staphylococcus spp. were present higher than 98% during fermentation in fermented sausage by starter culture inoculation, and Pediococcus spp. was dominant genus and increased from 53.53 to 74.09% during whole fermentation process. Moreover, the histamine accumulation was lower 84.17% in sausage fermented by starter culture inoculation than that of spontaneous sausage, suggesting that starter culture could decrease histamine accumulation of sausages significantly (P < 0.01). These results revealed that the starter culture inoculation was conducive to improve the microbial quality and food safety of Chinese Cantonese sausages. © Association of Food Scientists & Technologists (India) 2020.