Microbiological quality of imported frozen shrimp in Egypt

This research was undertaken to assess the microbiological quality of 109 samples of the following 7 different products of the imported frozen shrimp in Egypt, block broken peeled, block whole raw, block headless whole, IQF peeled headless, block peeled headless, IQF peeled deveined, and block peeled deveined frozen shrimp through the period 2014–2015. The results showed that the count of shrimp per pound, thawing weight loss, and pH of these products ranged from 20 to 400, from 1.94% to 2.38% and from 7.48 to 7.92, respectively among frozen shrimp products. The mean count of the total viable count (TVC), Enterobacteriaceae, coliform and Staphylococcus auerus varied from 4.8 × 103 to 7.7 × 108, from nil to 5.1 × 104, from nil to 4.1 × 103 and from nil to 5.9 × 102, respectively in the aforesaid frozen shrimp products. The count of TVC in 40 and 9% samples of block broken peeled, and block peeled headless frozen shrimp products, respectively was higher than the allowable limit (106 cfu/g) in the Egyptian Standards of Frozen Shrimp Specification. Enterobacteriaceae, coliform and coagulase active Staphylococci were detected in some analysed samples but in load less than those recommended by the Egyptian Organization for Standardization and Quality Control (2005). E. coli was not detected in any of analysed samples of the 7 frozen shrimp products.