A pre‐spoilage marker for bacterial activity in fortified wine, conversion of L‐malic acid to L‐lactic acid

G. de Revel, Ana Bela Capela, T. Hogg*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

12 Citations (Scopus)
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Abstract

Sixty‐one different fortified wines, from the Douro valley, inoculated with Lactobacillus hilgardii previously isolated from a spoiled fortified wine, were sampled progressively for 280 d. Samples were analysed for volatile acidity (acetic acid) and frozen for subsequent analysis where appropriate. After 280 d, 7/61 wines showed increases in volatile acidity of >0.5 g l‐1 and were considered spoiled. Retrospective analysis of frozen samples of spoilage‐positive wines showed that all had apparently undergone a malolactic conversion before the onset of heterolactic activity (acetate production). It is suggested that the monitoring of L‐lactic acid might be a method of detecting activity of spoilage lactobacilli before the onset of spoilage.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)329-332
Number of pages4
JournalLetters in Applied Microbiology
Volume18
Issue number6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jun 1994

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