OCCURRENCE AND ENUMERATION OF BACILLUS CEREUS IN EGYPTIAN DAIRY DESSERTS

Document Type : Research article

Authors

Abstract

A total of 200 random samples of Egyptian dairy desserts including flavoured ice cream; mehallabia, custard and rice pudding (each 50 samples) were collected from different dairy shops and supermarkets in El-Mansoura City,
province, Egypt. The samples were examined bacteriologically to enumerate and isolate Bacillus cereus using surface plating technique on Mannitol egg youlk phenol red polymyxin (MYP) agar plates. Bacillus cereus was found in 19 (38%); 22 (44%); 21(42%) and 32(64%) samples of flavoured ice cream, mehallabia, custard and rice pudding with a mean values of 9.68 x 104 + 3.43 x 104; 1.65 x 10 +0.56 x 10°; 1.71 x 10+ 0.60 x 10% and 2.39 x 107 + 1.5 x 10' cells/g, respectively. All B. cereus strains were highly sensitive to streptomycin, chlormphenicol, tetracycline, kanamycin, gentamycin, neomycin and erythromycin. Whereas all the isolates were resistante to colistin. The suggestive measures to minimize contamination of dairy desserts with B. cereus are discussed.

Keywords