Abstract:

This study aims to determine microbiological, sensory and color changes of whole European eel (Anguilla anguilla) aerobically stored at 2.00±1.00°C for 19 days. Samples were analyzed with periodical intervals in terms of Total Mesophilic Aerobic Bacteria (TMAB), Total Psychrophilic Aerobic Bacteria (TPAB), Psedumonas sp. and Lactic Acid Bacteria (LAB). For the sensory analysis, samples were evaluated to describe the changes in skin color and mucus, eyes shape and clarity, texture and odor. Description of color changes consisted of L*, a*, b*, ∆E, chroma and hue angle during the storage period. The count of TMAB, TPAB, Pseudomonas sp. and LAB were found to be 1.53±0.08; 1.08±0.12; 1.15±0.21 and 1.15±0.21 log cfu/g, respectively. Significant differences were not found for the first 2 days of the storage for any microbiological parameters (p>0.05). At the end of the storage time, the counts of microorganisms were significantly increased (p<0.05) and reached 8.08±0.65; 7.56±0.08; 7.53±0.76; 2.80±0.14 log cfu/g, respectively. In terms of sensory changes whole European eel samples were resulted unacceptable for consumption after 13 days of storage with an 8.20±0.83 sensory score while 9.75±0.95 was the highest score for the samples on day 19th. The changes in the color of the samples were significant on the first and 5th days of storage (p<0.05). ∆E, L* and b* values were significantly increased (p<0.05) while chroma and a values were decreased on day 5. Overall results for this study are proving that Pseudomonas sp. could be the indicator microorganism that could be used to determine the shelf life of European eel together with the sensory analysis, linear correlation with storage time was not obtained for ∆E or any other color parameters and whole European eel could be stored at 2.00°C for 13 days based on sensory and microbiological quality changes.

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