Microbial quality of selected sandwiches sold at retail outlets of fast food shops in Dhaka city and Mymensingh town of Bangladesh

The experiment was designed to undertake a study on the sanitary quality of commercial fast foods sold at retail outlets of fast food shops in Dhaka city and Mymensingh town of Bangladesh. One hundred sandwiches were subjected to bacteriological examinations. The mean values of total viable count (TVC), total coliform count (TCC) and total staphylococcal count (TSC) in wrapped and unwrapped samples of pre-microwave oven and post-microwave oven fast foods were determined. In pre-microwave oven the TVC, TCC and TSC were log 6.36, log 3.42 and log 4.21 respectively. Similarly in post-microwave oven the TVC, TCC and TSC were log 4.89, log 2.60 and log 3.03 respectively. The role of packaging and heat treatment prior to sale on the bacterial changes of the fast foods were demonstrated. It was observed that the values of TVC of all fast food samples except post-microwave oven treated McDonald’s; Pizza and Ruma were higher than the maximum microbial limit. In TCC and TSC all values were higher than the maximum limit. The degree of initial contamination in fast food samples which may pose health hazard to public health has been discussed. It was concluded that the hygienically packaged fast foods and microoven treatment prior to sale would retain the best quality attributes required for consumer’s acceptability and safety.

Keywords:

Sandwiches , Total viable count , Total coliform count , Total staphylococcal count ,