Scientists create the first international consensus definition of fermented foods

Jan 6, 2021

Humans have consumed different types of fermented foods – from kimchi to yogurt – for thousands of years.

Yet, it is only recently, with the availability of new scientific techniques to analyze their nutritional properties and microbiological composition, that scientists have started to understand exactly how unique flavors and textures are created and how these foods are beneficial to the human body. human health.

Today, 13 interdisciplinary scientists from the fields of microbiology, food science and technology, family medicine, ecology, immunology and microbial genetics came together to create the first international consensus definition of food fermented.

Their article, published in Nature Reviews Gastroenterology and Hepatology, defines fermented foods as: “foods prepared by the desired microbial growth and enzymatic conversions of food components”.

The authors are careful to note the difference between probiotics and live microbes associated with fermented foods.

The word “ probiotic ”, they say, applies only in special cases where the fermented food retains living microorganisms at the time of consumption, and only when the microorganisms are defined and demonstrated to be being beneficial for health, as shown in a scientific study.

“A lot of people think that fermented foods are good for you – and that may be true, but the scientific studies needed to prove it are limited and have mostly focused on certain types of fermented foods,” says the first author Maria Marco, professor in the Department of Food Science and Technology at the University of California, Davis.

Co-author Bob Hutkins, professor in the Department of Food Science and Technology at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln – who is the author of a well-known academic textbook on fermented foods – says, “We created this definition for cover the thousands of types of fermented foods around the world, as a starting point for further research into how these foods and their associated microbes affect human health. “

The consensus roundtable was organized in 2019 by the International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Prebiotics (ISAPP), a non-profit organization responsible for published consensus scientific definitions of probiotics (in 2014) and prebiotics (in 2017 ).

To date, different people have had different ideas about what constitutes a fermented food. The new definition provides a clear concept that can be understood by the general public, members of the industry and regulators. “

Mary Ellen Sanders, Scientific Director, International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Prebiotics

Currently, the evidence for the positive health effects of fermented foods is based more on epidemiological and population-based studies and less on randomized controlled trials.

The authors expect that, in the coming years, scientists will undertake more research based on hypotheses on how different fermented foods around the world – derived from dairy products, fruits, vegetables, grains and even from meats – affect human physiology and improve human health.