Research Findings on Listeria Growth in Caramel Apples

The Listeria outbreak associated with caramel apples has raised questions regarding how the Listeria was able to grow in an acidic fruit.  Researchers have found that inserting the stick in the apple was an important factor as well as also storing at room temperature.  So when the stick is inserted, it drives the organism into the apple, and the stick causes cellular damage to the apple, creating conditions that allow the Listeria to grow sufficiently when stored at room temperature.

It would be wise for those selling caramel apples to store them at refrigeration temperature and limit the shelf-life to less than 28 days.

The other point made by the researchers in this study is the concept of microenvironments existing at interfaces in food, in this case, the interface of stick and the apple.  When inserted, the stick changes the apple matrix enough to allow Listeria to grow.  Normally, the apple pH would be too low to support the growth of Listeria.

It is easy to overlook microenvironments that exist in food.  They can arise in multicomponent foods with particulates, in foods at the packaging interface, or in foods that allow moisture migration to surface changing the moisture content.  The interaction at these interfaces can impact preventive factors such as pH,  water activity (Aw), or preservative concentration.

 

MBio - American Society of Microbiology

http://mbio.asm.org/content/6/5/e01232-15

Growth of Listeria monocytogenes within a Caramel-Coated Apple Microenvironment

Kathleen A. Glass,  Max C. Golden,  Brandon J. Wanless,  Wendy Bedale,  Charles Czuprynski

+ Author Affiliations

Food Research Institute, University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison, Wisconsin, USA

Address correspondence to Kathleen Glass, kglass@wisc.edu.

Editor Stefan H. E. Kaufmann, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology

ABSTRACT

A 2014 multistate listeriosis outbreak was linked to consumption of caramel-coated apples, an unexpected and previously unreported vehicle for Listeria monocytogenes. This outbreak was unanticipated because both the pH of apples (<4.0) and the water activity of the caramel coating (<0.80) are too low to support Listeria growth. In this study, Granny Smith apples were inoculated with approximately 4 log10 CFU of L. monocytogenes (a cocktail of serotype 4b strains associated with the outbreak) on each apple’s skin, stem, and calyx. Half of the apples had sticks inserted into the core, while the remaining apples were left intact. Apples were dipped into hot caramel and stored at either 7°C or 25°C for up to 11 or 28 days, respectively. Data revealed that apples with inserted sticks supported significantly more L. monocytogenes growth than apples without sticks under both storage conditions. Within 3 days at 25°C, L. monocytogenes populations increased >3 log10 in apples with sticks, whereas only a 1-log10 increase was observed even after 1 week for caramel-coated apples without sticks. When stored at 7°C, apples with sticks exhibited an approximately 1.5-log10 increase in L. monocytogenes levels at 28 days, whereas no growth was observed in apples without sticks. We infer that insertion of a stick into the apple accelerates the transfer of juice from the interior of the apple to its surface, creating a microenvironment at the apple-caramel interface where L. monocytogenes can rapidly grow to levels sufficient to cause disease when stored at room temperature.

IMPORTANCE Neither caramel nor apples are a food where the pathogenic bacterium Listeria monocytogenes should grow, as caramel does not contain enough free water and apples are too acidic. Caramel-coated apples, however, were recently linked to a deadly outbreak of listeriosis. We hypothesized that inserting a stick into the apple releases juice to the interface between the apple and caramel, providing a more hospitable environment than either component alone. To test this hypothesis, apples were inoculated with L. monocytogenes prior to caramel dipping. Some apples had sticks inserted into them before dipping, while others did not. No growth of L. monocytogenes occurred on refrigerated caramel apples without sticks, whereas slow growth was observed on refrigerated caramel apples with sticks. In contrast, significant pathogen growth was observed within 3 days at room temperature on caramel apples with sticks inserted. Food producers should consider interfaces between components within foods as potential niches for pathogen growth.