Whether you enjoy an aromatic tape with notes of caramel or something less fictional, chocolate can contain many tastes. Researchers now say they have cast a new light on a major component that can open the door to new flavors.
They claim that they are not disappeared, how and why bacteria and fungi affect the fermentation of cocoa pills on the flavor of chocolate.
“We now understand what the microbes we need and what they do. I think this opens the opportunity … to be much more directed [about] Professor David Salt, co -author of the work of the University of Nottingham, said how to make our chocolate in terms of its flavor.
Writing in the Microbiology Journal NatureThe team reported how they studied in fermented beans on cocoa farms in three different regions of Colombia – Santander, Hoyla and Tantiocia.
The researchers found that although the fermentation process was similar to Santander and Hoyla farms, beans on the Antiokia farm showed different temperature and acidity patterns, which were likely to have a different group of microbes.
More research revealed that although cocoa wines made of beans on Santander and Huhala farms had fruits, flowers and citrus notes – similar to the properties of the micro flavor of cocoa from Madagascar – cocoa wines made of beans from beans intended by beans from beans that the beans intend from the coast. Chocolate production.
Then the team used the genetic sequence to identify the microbes involved in fermenting the cocoa from multiple locations in Colombia and outside, and explore the genes that contain it, thus identifying flavor materials that can produce it during fermentation.
As a result, the researchers identified nine microbes that were expected to produce notes from the Cocoa flavor. Then they presented this society to sterile cocoa pills, and allowed them to ferment.
The salt said that the result was cocoa with notes of flowers, fruits, citrus fruits and cocoa flavor that can be recognized, but with the decrease in the agency and bitterness.
“I call it the secret sauce.”
He said the results can have a number of applications, including helping cocoa farmers find ways to enhance the presence of the main microbes during fermentation to ensure that they can reproduce the conditions required for high -quality cocoa.
Salt said that it can help in the current crisis in the cost of chocolate, indicating that if cocoa farmers can produce more slim cocoa, then less will be needed during production.
There was another possibility.
“You can bring either the vaccine [of microbes] He said: “This may bring to specific flavors, new flavors that you do not usually see in cocoa. Or you can already reach strategies to bias fermentation, and reach new flavors.”