Microbiology and Troubleshooting Spoilage...•Spoilage microorganism was identified as...

Microbiology and Troubleshooting Spoilage

Cindy Austin

2018 FAFP Annual Meeting

St. Petersburg, FL

Topics Covered

• Case studies

• Investigation procedures

• Questions

Sanitation Team

• Our job is to eliminate potential spoilage organisms and pathogens from food production equipment through SANITATION

Factors Affecting Growth/Survival of Microbes on Line

• Availability of food

• Product build-up on the line allows microbes to survive and grow more easily.

• Availability of water

• “Wet” lines are more susceptible to microbes than “Dry” lines

• Temperature

• Microbes all have a preferred temperature range that they like to grow at.

• Susceptibility to sanitizers

• Vegetative bacteria are the most susceptible and spores are the most resistant.

Growth of Microbes on a Line

• If minimal food and water are available microbes will grow

• Even if conditions are not proper for growth, many microbes will survive

• Why do we care if microbes grow or just survive?

Growth vs. Survival

• It does not take many microbes to spoil food, depending on the food and storage conditions.

• If there are a lot of microbes present (growing) on a line, your chance of spoilage increases dramatically.

• The more there are, the harder they are to eliminate.

• Pathogens are often found at low levels.

• Many can cause disease at low levels.

• Many microbes are able to survive on lines for long periods of time.

Onset of Spoilage in Foods

• Spoilage becomes apparent when the microbial counts are in excess of 1.0 x 107 cfu/g (10,000,000 cfu/g)

• High numbers = many byproducts of metabolism

• Proteases – Breaks down proteins

• Carbohydrate complexes – Slime

• Oxidation – Produces off flavors and odors

• Gas – Puffy packages and off odors

• Acids – Sour flavors

• Visible colonies result when numbers exceed 1.0 x 108 cfu/g

• Yeast and mold colonies

Three Ways to Prevent Microbial “Opportunities”

• Kill microbes

• Keep them out in the first place

• Keep them from growing

• Sanitation is key in killing microbes and keeping them from contaminating our products.

Trouble Shooting Food Spoilage and Pathogens

Spoilage Case Studies – Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

• The Problem:

• Very tight containers, lots of gas production creating pressure in bottles

• Dressing oozing out of bottles when opened; gas and off-odor are detectable.

• Only in 8-oz. bottles NOT 16-oz.

• Microbe responsible was identified as Lactobacillus buchneri

• Where was this coming from??????

Spoilage Case Studies - Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

• The Investigation:

• Ingredients?

• Onion powder had microbes but not this one

• Equipment?

• Only sporadic problems

• Was is certain fillers?

• Yes, found a problem with the filler head for 8 oz. bottles

Spoilage Case Studies - Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

• What was the issue?

• Filler head was from obsolete equipment at a sister plant.

• Sister plant had converted a 16 oz. head to a 8 oz. head by adding a sleeve.

• Sleeve had water, and several different dressings inside.

• Excellent breeding ground for microbes and very difficult to detect.

• No one knew the sleeve existed as it was done at the sister plant so it was cleaned just like any other filler head.

• Fixing the spoilage issue required replacing the filler head OR removing it at every sanitation cycle to thoroughly clean and sanitize it.

Spoilage Case Studies - Braunschweiger

• The Problem:

• Packages getting very swollen and had an acidic taste.

• When tested, the pH had dropped from 6.1 to 5.4.

• Gas buildup caused the meat to ooze out of the package

• This was a cook-in-bag item so it should be free of bacteria

• Many different code dates affected


• In-depth investigation of processing line and ingredients was performed.

• Equipment swabs taken

• Tested raw ingredients

• Tested finished product immediately after cook and after chill

• Tested rework


• Results

• Detected >1,000 cfu/g lactic acid bacteria in finished product immediately after cook

• Detected >1,000 cfu/g lactic acid bacteria in finished product immediately after chill

• Detected >100,000 cfu/g lactic acid bacteria in rework

• RTE equipment swabs were acceptable

• Raw equipment swabs were >1,000,000 cfu/area swabbed

• Found meat in filler-vacuum space

• Bowl chopper/mixer also had high counts


• What was going on?

• New vacuumizer on the line could not be effectively cleaned daily and bowl chopper was not routinely taken apart to clean at all.

• Meat that could not be cleaned from the line was a breeding ground for the spoilage bacteria.

• This bacteria was fed into many packages

• Rework usage limit of 30 days allowed for very high growth of LAB.

• The high levels of LAB could not be eliminated by the cook cycle.


• Corrective Actions

• Vacuumizer was replaced

• Routine teardown of the bowl chopper was implemented.

• All rework in inventory was destroyed and usage age was limited to 14 days.

Spoilage Case Studies – Sport Drink

• The Problem:

• Containers had visible mold growth, off odors and off flavors were also present.

• There was no juice in this particular sku

• Spoilage microorganism was identified as Alicyclobacillus

• Spore-forming bacteria commonly found in juices that can survive typical pasteurization techniques

• Product was heat-treated prior to packaging.


• The investigation:

• A different product made on the same line contained sugar and some juice.

• This product was cooked to over 240°F

• The sport drink was only heated to 195°F

• The product that was cooked to over 240°F was almost always produced on the line before the sport drink.

• Investigational samples led to identifying a mixer shared by both products


• Conclusions:

• Mostly likely the sugar and juice ingredients in the other product contained the Alicyclobaccilus organism that had spoiled the sport drink.

• The lack of sanitation between products caused a cross-contamination issue and the lower heat treatment of the sport drink did not eliminate this microorganism.

Spoilage Case Studies – Packaged Sliced Meat

• The Problem:

• Consumer complaint reports showed an increase in spoilage complaints for packaged meat (turkey and ham) items in January.

• Plant micro and shelf life data showed no evidence of a problem at either of two plants that made the product.

• Monthly consumer complaint data continued to show an increasing spoilage trend.

• Complaint data showed that line #3 in Plant A was the culprit, however plant shelf life data still did not indicate a spoilage issue.


• The investigation and corrective actions:

• A large chain grocery store customer complains about puffy/swollen packages and pulls all product from shelves.

• Targeted micro sampling was increased on Line #3 and all samples were plated on agar and not petrifilm (normal procedure)

• Results showed significantly higher micro counts on several slicer areas.

• Deeps cleans and aggressive steam cleaning of all Plant A lines was initiated along with a test and hold procedure of all new product lots.

• Any affected product was destroyed.


• Lessons learned:

• Shelf life program was not adequate to predict emerging product spoilage issues.

• A laboratory change to petrifilm from agar resulted in failure to identify presence of spoilage bacteria.

• This particular organism was a high acid producer and the dye on the petrifilm was acid sensitive.

• Therefore, colonies appeared colorless on petrifilm

• Consumer contact data was not sufficient to allow for early diagnosis of emerging spoilage issue.

• Not enough information was collected form the consumer to narrow down where the problem was originating.

• Poor design of meat slicer caused cleanability issues, leading to high micro load in finished product.


• Consumer complaints for spoilage increased again in August!

• What did they miss?

• The plant micro data was showing an increase in counts on the line but no one was tracking it!

• Micro data indicated that the slicing lines needed to be deep cleaned and steamed more often than originally thought.

Smart TM Color Change Technologies

• In 1978 Manfred Thonhauser worked as a brewmaster for the Vienna Brewery Schwechat and performed hygiene checks in cleaned tanks and vessels

• This is where he first envisioned of a smart cleaning process that could verify the hygiene at the same time.


• In 1998 his son Philip Thonhauser took over the company his father created and developed the PST technology which has been developed for several applications beginning with draft beer line cleaning.


• Visually detectable at 1-2 µg/cm2 glucose or 5 µg/cm2

albumin

• SMART GEL is 10-100 times more sensitive as protein-, glucose-, and ATP tests when testing on dairy, lemonade, ketchup and sausage products.

Investigation and Resolution of Spoilage Problems

• Begins by keeping an eye on your INDICATORS

• Clean equipment swabs

• In-process samples

• Environmental air samples

• Compressed air samples

• Observing – If it does not look right, it is probably not right!

Microbiological Sampling – Routine Basis

• After cleaning, you should sample for one or more of the following:

• Coliforms

• Yeast and mold

• TPC

• Lactic Acid Bacteria

• This measures your program’s effectiveness

• Swabbing after cleaning but before sanitizing will tell you how effective your cleaning procedures are.

• Swabbing after both cleaning and sanitizing will tell you how effective your entire sanitation procedure is.

Microbiological Sampling – Routine Basis

• Perform microbiological testing with swabs and record data.

• Compare to industry standards

• Compare to plant historical data

• Make sure to track and trend plant results to identify issues early.

• Corrective action for out-of-standard results is essential.

• Helps eliminate potential harborage niches for both spoilage microbes and pathogens.

Other Micro Samples – Routine Basis

• Water

• TPC and Coliform

• Air

• Yeast and mold, perhaps TPC

• Raw ingredient testing

• Finished product testing

Other Micro Samples – Routine Basis

• What about ATP sampling?

• Does not differentiate between bacterial/fungi ATP and that found in other organic material residues.

• Provides an overall picture of cleanliness

• Requires much work to extrapolate ATP results with expected microbe contamination.

• Should not replace actual clean equipment micro swabs.

• Provides great, immediate feedback and is a great learning tool.

Investigation of Spoilage –

Beyond Routine Micro Sampling

• If product is spoiling in the marketplace, then the investigation should intensify

• Observe spoilage characteristics of the product

• Isolate microbe

• May be able to match product isolate to equipment isolate

• Review sampling data from plant

• Review and observe sanitation procedures

• Increase sampling points to try and pinpoint the responsible equipment.

Investigation of Spoilage – The Bottom Line

• Sanitation practices should be reviewed

• Microbiological sampling should be reviewed

• Results compared to baseline/historical data

• Microbiological sampling should increase

• Investigate line for “hidden” areas that are hard to reach

• Not always necessary to exactly identify the microbe responsible

• Not all spoilage issues will be confirmed and resolved for a nice story to tell.

The Challenge

• Find time to investigate out of spec results before it becomes a product issue

• Make it the highest priority for everyone on the team.

Summary

• Microbes are everywhere

• To keep foods from spoiling or making people sick you need to:

• Keep the microbes out,

• Keep them from growing

• Kill them

• Sanitation is critical in avoiding spoilage and illness associated with our foods.

Microbiology and Troubleshooting Spoilage...•Spoilage microorganism was identified as...

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