Starter-culture to improve the quality of cereal-based fermented foods: trends in selection and application

•Spontaneously fermented cereal foods are not stable, safe and consistent in quality.•Carefully selected autochthonous microbial strains can contribute to a predictable and reproducible improvement of fermented cereal foods.•Recent considerations for selection of multifunctional strains are highlighted.•Applications of defined starter cultures to improve specific attributes of cereal fermented foods are examined.•The use of starter cultures hold great prospects to meet market demands on cereal fermented foods.

Cereals are the most important food crop globally. Greater part of cultivated cereals is subjected to fermentation by the best adapted strains from a contaminating mix of microorganisms, generating varieties of foods and beverages that are inconsistent in quality. Recently, fresh demands for quality consistency, stability, safety and specific health benefits have been placed on fermented cereal products. Accumulated scientific evidences show that careful selection and use of autochthonous multifunctional microbial strains can contribute to predictable and reproducible improvement of the safety, nutritional, organoleptic and functional quality of fermented cereal foods. We highlight trendy criteria to prospect for native multifunctional strains from indigenous cereal fermented products and examine their application as starter cultures with specific focus on the improvement of cereal substrates to meet contemporary market demands.