Microbial contamination of frozen foods

Establishing microbiological specifications between trading partners gains increasing importance also for frozen food products. Realistic demands on m icrobiological quality of raw material, ingredients and end products are no t possible without information about microbiological data for good manufact uring practice. Microbiological criteria fixed in legislation or proposed b y official groups of experts exist only for few products and groups of micr o-organisms. In the study described here, 3,500 samples of frozen foods des tined for the consumer were analyzed to enumerate mesophilic aerobic total count, acid tolerant lactobacilli, pseudomonads, Enterobacteriaceae, colifo rms, E. coli, coagulase-positive staphylococci, enterococci, yeasts, moulds and anaerobic sulphite reducing sporeformers. The results of statistical a nalysis are shown as 80- and 95-percentiles of these micro-organisms for th e following categories of frozen foods: 1) ready-to-serve meals, raw/partia lly-cooked. 2) ready-to-serve meals, cooked, 3) bread, cakes and pastries, 4) ice cream, 5) fruit, 6) vegetables and herbs, 7) potato products.