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Appl Environ Microbiol. 1971 March; 21(3): 459-465
Copyright © 1971 American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Microorganisms of the San Francisco Sour Dough Bread Process

II. Isolation and Characterization of Undescribed Bacterial Species Responsible for the Souring Activity

Western Regional Research Laboratory, Western Utilization R and D Division, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Albany, California 94710

ABSTRACT

A medium was developed which permitted isolation, apparently for the first time, of the bacteria responsible for the acid production in the 100-year-old San Francisco sour dough French bread process. Some of the essential ingredients of this medium included a specific requirement for maltose at a high level, Tween 80, freshly prepared yeast extractives, and an initial pH of not over 6.0. The bacteria were gram-positive, nonmotile, catalase-negative, short to medium slender rods, indifferent to oxygen, and producers of lactic and acetic acids with the latter varying from 3 to 26% of the total. Carbon dioxide was also produced. Their requirement for maltose for rapid and heavy growth and a proclivity for forming involuted, filamentous, and pleomorphic forms raises a question as to whether they should be properly grouped with the heterofermentative lactobacilli.