Abstract:
Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) have long been used as starters in non-dairy cereal fermentation,
as they aid in the production of products such as yoghurt and cheese. Broken rice milk is a plant-based
milk alternative that is high in carbs and low in fat, providing excellent nutritional value to human
users. The current study intends to ferment broken rice milk supplemented with 6% skim milk using
three Lactobacillus strains for the development of yoghurt products, as well as to evaluate the growth,
changes in physio-chemical properties, and sensory qualities of the yoghurt produced. Lactobacillus
bulgaricus, Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus acidophilus, and a commercial yoghurt culture consortium
fermented broken rice milk after 8 h. Rather than employing L. acidophilus or a commercial yogurt
culture consortia, L. bulgarics was the most efficient starter for yoghurt manufacturing, followed by
L. casei. L. bulgaricus had the highest viability counts of 8.5 Log CFU/mL, 0.18 specific growth rate,
and 3.78 doubling time. Furthermore, it produces a significant reduction in pH to 4.3 and increases
total titratable acidity to 0.09 percent with high overall acidity values of 1.4 mg/L of acetic and lactic
acid contents. The maximum acidification rate (Vmax) was 0.2125, the maximum acidification time
(Tmax) was 4 h, and the time to reach pH 4.6 (Te) was 5 to 8 h. As a result, L. bulgaricus was chosen
as the most efficient isolate for the production of fermented rice milk yoghurt. More research is
needed, however, to investigate the new rice-based yoghurt product’s sensory qualities as well as its
toxicological effects on normal and malignant human cells.
