Fungal contamination of locally produced processed cheese

ABSTRACT

One hundred and forty four random samples of locally produced processed cheese were collected from different supermarkets and groceries shops in El Boheira province, represented as 100 samples of processed cheese, 24 of processed cheese spread and 20 samples of processed cheese blocks. All collected samples were examined mycologically. The mean values of total mold count for processed cheese samples were 1.44x10, 1.14x10, 1.67x10, 1.22x10 and 1.10, respectively. while processed cheese spread samples were all free from any mold contamination, but that for examined processed cheese blocks samples were 2.25x10 and 2.29x10, respectively. The most common species isolated from processed cheese were Penicillium, Cladosporium and Altemaria species, while species of low incidence were Fusarium, Geotrichum, Nigrospora, Rhizopus, Mucor, Basilomyces, Aspergillus fumigatus and Aspergillus flavus. Also the most common species were Alternaria and Penicillium while Mucor, Cladosporium and Aspergillus fumigatus were less common in processed cheese blocks. Aspergillus flavus isolated from 3 samples of processed cheese, were examined for its toxigenicity and were found as 6, 4 and 5 ppb respectively