1. Introduction
Milk and dairy products are one of the indispensable natural foods due to their alimentary wholesome benefits. They are deservedly preferred by many people around the world [
1,
2,
3,
4]. The conductive effect of these products can be explained by their composition and the fact that they have an important place in the rational, prophylactic and dietary nutrition of humans because they are vital for the maintenance of human body [
1,
5,
6].
Yoghurt is a food obtained by bacterial fermentation of milk and is consumed all over the world [
7]. The bacteria used for yoghurts production are known as yoghurt cultures or starter culture.
Lactobacillus bulgaricus and
Streptococcus thermophilus are the two microorganisms involved in the fermentation of yogurt [
8,
9,
10]. These bacteria provoke the fermentation of milk and produces lactic acid in order to change the yoghurt’s texture and flavor. Different kind of milks (cow’s, sheep’s, goat’s, mare’s, camel’s) can be used for yoghurts production. There is an increasing scientific and consumer interest in goat’s milk production in the recent years [
11]. Goat’s milk is the most easily digestible dairy product and its amino acid composition is similar to human milk which distinguishes it from other milks. It has high quality protein, fat, vitamins and minerals [
12,
13]. This milk can be consumed from people who can’t eat cow’s milk because it doesn’t contain αs1-casein, which causes various types of intolerance to milk [
10]. Goat’s milk can be successfully used for yoghurts production individually or mixed with cow’s, sheep’s and mare’s milk [
14].
Microbiological, physicochemical, organoleptic and rheological characteristics are the fundamental characteristics of yoghurts that influence the acceptance and choices for consumers [
8]. One way to improve texture quality of yoghurts is to increase the dry matter content which in the traditional method can be achieved by the addition of milk concentrated by evaporation, powdered milk or protein concentrates [
15,
16,
17]. The conventional method for milk concentration is evaporation [
18]. It is important to note that this process has many negative effects because it can change the characteristics of thermolabile whey proteins [
19]. The application of evaporation can reduce the product quality due to the negative effect of thermal treatment on heat sensitive milk components.
Nowadays the consumer interest is focused on natural foods produced transparently and with minimal addition of additive. Membrane processes such as nanofiltration, ultrafiltration, microfiltration and reverse osmosis can allow producers to avoid the addition of milk powder and to offer products with a more healthful profile [
20,
21]. Separation and concentration of milk substances can be conducted by ultrafiltration [
22,
23,
24,
25]. This method is preferred due to its advantages – low energy costs, novel non thermal environmental friendly technology that reduces the negative effect of temperature rise such as phase change, denaturation of proteins and change in sensory properties [
26,
27].
The aim of this experimental work was to study the fundamental properties (microbiological, physicochemical, organoleptic and rheological) of goat’s yoghurts produced by ultrafiltration at different concentration level and starter cultures.
4. Discussion
Table 1 shows the rise in the dry matter, fat and protein contents during ultrafiltration. This could be explained by the passage of the water and low molecular weight subtstances (such as lactose, salts, and some vitamins) through the membrane [
44]. Tamime et al. found that the ultrafiltration caused a little more pronounced increase in the fats than in the proteins [
45]. Ultrafiltration and constant-volume diafiltration was used for obtaining of milk protein concentrates of protein content > 80 % on dry basis [
46]. Ultrafiltration of skim milk was used to remove water, lactose, peptides and other solutes partially. Gavazzi-April et al. established that the molecular weight cut-off of the membranes affects the retention of main components - UF membrane of molecular weight cut-off 10 kDa showed better protein retention in comparison to 50 kDa [
47]. Domagala found a significant increase in the acidity of the retentates, but the pH stayed mostly the same after twofold ultrafiltration concentration of goat’s milk with 30 kDa membrane [
48]. Hihger acidity in retentates could be explained by the change in the buffering capacity which depends on the milk composition, including protein content [
49].
Quite expected, the dry matter, fats and proteins in the yoghurts increased with the rise in the concentration level during ultrafiltration (
Table 2). The past few years the consumer interest to the high-protein yoghurt has increased because of its better taste and texture. There is also more scientific data on the health benefits of the dairy proteins. Different processing techniques, including membrane processes, affect the composition, rheology, structure, and sensory characteristics of yoghurts [
50].
Comparing the microbiological properties of the yoghurts with the three starters, it could be seen that probiotic yoghurts having the highest count of viable cells were these with MZ
2f +
Bifidobacterium bifidum BB – 87 followed by MZ
2f +
Lactobacillus acidophilus LAB - 8 and MZ
2f alone (
Figure 3). According to Ordonez et al., the ultrafiltration could be applied to increase the protein content which led to a higher concentration of
Lactobacillus acidophilus, Bifidobacterium bifidum, Streptococcus thermophilus and
Lactobacillus delbrueckii ssp.
bulgaricus [
51]. According to Moineau - Jean et al., the application of 50 kDa ultrafiltration membrane used to obtain a retentate with 10.6 % protein content resulted in a rise in the concentration of
Lb.
helveticus R0052 and
S.
thermophlius [
52]. The application of ultrafiltration increased the peptides and amino acids and thus improved the survival of probiotic strains [
53]. Ultrafiltration causes a concentration of caseins leading to a rise of buffering capacity of milk and reduction of pH. This leads to a better growth of lactic acid bacteria in fermented ultrafiltration retentates compared to the fermented goat’s milk without ultrafiltration.
The ultrafiltration increased the protein content of yoghurts and thus favored the growth of lactic acid bacteria. This provokes a rise in the titratable acidity of yoghurts obtained by ultrafiltration [
54,
55]. The highest value of pH was established for MZ
2f on the 1
st day of storage – 5.05, the lowest – 4.08 for
Lactobacillus acidophilus LAB – 8 on the 30
th of storage period (
Figure 4). This was probably due to the lactic and succinic acid produced by
Lactobacillus acidophilus LAB - 8 [
56].
Figure 4 indicates that ultrafiltration caused a decrease in pH for all starters studied. The concentration of casein fractions during ultrafiltration increased the enzymes’ activity and thus improved the sugar metabolism of
S. thermophilus and
Lb.
bulgaricus and lactic acid production [
57]. The concentration by ultrafiltration led to an increase in the number of viable lactic acid bacteria cells in comparison to the plain yoghurt [
58]. Therefore, the higher number of lactic acid bacteria in yoghurts obtained by ultarfiltration provoke hihger acid production, leading to higher titratable acidity during storage [
54].
Figure 5 shows that the sample C had the highest score, followed by sample B and sample A for all three starters. The last indicates that the use of ultrafiltration improves the organoleptic properties of the yogurts. According to [
50], the membrane processes change the yoghurt composition, structure and thus the sensory properties of the products. It could be seen that the ultrafiltration concentration at low levels (VRR 2 and 3) enhances the organoleptic score of yoghurts but higher
VRR probably would embarrass the coagulation of milk and will make the final product with high fat content.
Skriver et al. investigated the effect of the dry matter content, temperature during fermentation and composition of bacteria cultures on the rheological behavior of stirred yoghurt [
59]. A pseudoplastic behaviour was valid for some yoghurts, but some of the specimens had Bingham plastic behaviour. The profile of the flow curves depended on the applied manufacturing conditions. Our results showed that comparing the three starters, it could be seen that MZ
2f +
Bifidobacterium bifidum BB - 87 had the highest values of shear stress, followed by MZ
2f +
Lactobacillus acidophilus LAB – 8 and MZ
2f for all samples. Prasanna et al. established that the use of starters producing higher concentrations of exopolysaccharides leads to an improvement in the physicochemical and rheological properties of food products [
60]. Girard et al. found that using exopolysaccharide-producing strains of lactic acid bacteria results in a dense structure of the products because the exopolysaccharide structures cause the linkages between the proteins in the milk and dairy products [
61]. This also led to an increase in the strength and viscosity of the resulting products. The highest shear stress was observed when ultrafiltration concentration at VRR 3 and
Bifidobacterium bifidum BB - 87 were used. According to [
62], the shear stress of yoghurt increased by fat and protein levels. Miocinovic et al. proved that the addition of milk proteins to goat’s milk improved its textural, rheological, and sensory characteristics [
63]. Meena et al. found a positive correlation between the firmness, the shear stress and the protein content [
44].
The rise in the ultrafiltration concentration level increased the yield stress of yoghurts obtained with three probiotic starters (
Table 3). According to [
64], the increase in the protein content increased the yield stress. It led to protein chain extension and increase the elasticity and stability of the obtained products.
The dynamic viscosity of yoghurts increased when ultrafiltration was applied (
Figure 7). Shaker et al. studied the influence of the fat on the rheological characteristics of yogurt during the coagulation process and found that an increase in the milk fat content led to a significant increase in the viscosity [
65]. According to [
66], the use of ultrafiltration led to a higher dry matter content of milk which favors the rheological and texture chracteristics of dairy products. There was an increase in the viscosity, hardness, and cohesiveness of coagulum and all these affected the final quality of the product. The highest values of dynamic viscosity were established in milk with starter MZ
2f +
Bifidobacterium bifidum BB – 87, followed by MZ
2f +
Lactobacillus acidophilus LAB – 8 and MZ
2f.
Author Contributions
Conceptualization, M.D.; methodology, M.D. and Z.D.; software, M.D. and S.K.; validation, M.D.; formal analysis, M.D., S.K., V.Y., A.S. and Z.D.; investigation, M.D., S.K., V.Y., A.S. and Z.D.; resources, M.D.; data curation, M.D. and S.K.; writing—original draft preparation, M.D.; writing—review and editing, M.D., S.K., A.S. and N.M.; visualization, M.D., S.K., A.S. and N.M.; supervision, M.D.; project administration, M.D., funding acquisition, N.M. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.