Viability of Lactobacillus casei in chocolate flan and its survival to simulated gastrointestinal conditions

Abstract

The aim of this work was to verify the viability of Lactobacillus casei in chocolate flan as well as its survival under simulated human gastrointestinal conditions. After 1 and 15 days of manufacture, the dessert was evaluated for L. casei population and subsequently submitted to acidic solution for 30, 60, 90 and 120 min and to bile salts solution for 150 min. After each time, L. casei population was evaluated. The results were evaluated by variance analysis (ANOVA) and Tukey's test. The population of L. casei in the flan was above 109 CFU/g during the shelf life, whose value is above the limit established for a probiotic food by the Brazilian legislation. L. casei was relatively resistant to the simulated gastrointestinal conditions tested in this study, once the population reduced during the in vitro tests but remained above 106 CFU/g. Chocolate flan showed to be an excellent food for addition of probiotic microorganisms, especially L. casei, once it was observed high populations in the product even after in vitro resistance tests simulating the human digestive process.