Meat Science

BACTERIA IN CANNED FOODS

• It was at one time thought that, the keeping quality of canned foods depend upon the complete exhaustion of air.
• Later, it was suggested that, heating destroy all microorganisms, while the sealing of the can prevented entry of others and the decomposition when it occurred was due to faulty sterilization or to entry of bacteria to the fault in the cans.
• Neither of these views expresses the whole truth because, living bacteria can after found in the sound and wholesome food.
• Bacteriological methods show that many canned meat or meat products contain living organisms even after modern processing methods.
• The mere presence of living organisms is of little or no significance in assessing the soundness of canned goods.
• The organism responsible for spoilage in canned foods may be spore-forming organisms and therefore, resistant to commercial processing,  or they may be a non-sporing organism, which gains access to the cans by leakages after processing.
• Presence of yeasts, moulds or non-sporing bacteria in canned meat foods is evidence of the leakage after after csealing lean and can make the food unsound.
• Canned goods which, on opening show such evidence should be condemned.