> Korean Fermented Foods >Stories of Microorganisms
>Diary products and Microorganisms
Dairy products like yogurt or cheese are manufactured using
lactic acid bacteria.
Yogurt is made by the process that they sterilize properly
concentrated non-fat milk by heat and add to it the lactic
acid bacteria called a ‘starter’ to make them
cultured in it. Generally Lactobacillus bulgaricus
or Streptococcus lactis is used for fermentation,
but the companies have been developing their own strain
and using it for fermentation recently.
These lactic bacteria are not sterilized after the fermentation,
so yogurt contains many lactic bacilli alive in it. And
these bacteria have the function of suppressing the growth
of harmful intestinal bacteria including coli. The lactic
bacteria are also used as a starter in making cheese as
in yogurt, but more various kinds of microorganisms are
used in making cheese than in yogurt. There are the cheeses
fermented by using mold, and of which surface color may
look red or black.