Whole soybean as probiotic lactic acid bacteria carrier food in solid-state fermentation

For the purpose of preparing lactic acid bacteria (LAB) carrier food, the solid-state fermentation of whole soybean was performed using Bifidobacterium animalis 937, Lactobacillus casei Zhang and Lactobacillus plantarum P-8 mixed with Bacillus subtilis natto, respectively. The physicochemical properties, the amino nitrogen content and peptide molecular weight distribution of the fermented whole soybean products were examined during this process. After 48 h of fermentation, the viable counts of the three samples were 1.41 × 10⁸ CFU/g (B. animalis 937), 1.74 × 10¹⁰ CFU/g (L. casei Zhang) and 2.19 × 10¹⁰ CFU/g (L. plantarum P-8), with the pH declined rapidly from 6.32 to 5.78, 5.60 and 5.44 at the early stage of the fermentation and increased to 6.71, 6.47 and 6.60 at the later stage of the fermentation. The fermentation caused a sharply increase in the content of the free amino nitrogen from 99.7 μmol/g to 301.9 μmol/g, 390.1 μmol/g and 529.1 μmol/g in the solid fermented soybean products, due to the multiplication of microorganism and the effect of enzyme system. Furthermore, the levels of soybean peptide with molecular weight less than 1000 Da increased 30.7%, 71.2% and 81.3% relative to that of the control group at 48 h. The result of the present work implied that whole soybean fermented by LAB can provide the different probiotics for the host, and there is potential to develope nutritious fermented soybean products.