ABSTRACT
Wara is a traditional soft, white, unsalted, and unripened cheese made primarily by the Fulani people of West Africa from cow's milk. Despite its widespread consumption, in-depth study of wara's nutritional and microbiological properties is lacking. This study was conducted to evaluate the proximate composition and microbiological characteristics in the warasamples from Okada.Forty (40) wara samples were collected from January to April from Okada community and transported to the laboratory of the department of Animal science and homogenized. Five replicates of the wara samples were sampled monthly and chemically evaluated according to the AOAC(2016) procedure. The microbial analysis was done using the standard cultural, morphological and biochemical procedure. Nutrient agar (NA) and potato dextrose agar (PDA) were procedurally prepared according to manufacturer’s instructions and placed into petri dishes, and samples for microbiological analysis were serially diluted using the standard plate method, 1mL of the appropriate dilution of the serially diluted wara was plated in NA for isolation of bacterial and PDA for isolation of fungi and each petri dish were appropriately labelled. The growth of the microorganism was observed in the petri dishes after 24 and 48 hours respectively. The organism where then subcultuerd in new petri dishes and taken to the laboratory for cultural, biochemical and morphological evaluations. The pH values of the wara samples ranged from 5.14-5.36, the ash, moisture content and fat (%) obtained varied non significantly (P>0.05) between 2.100-2.26, 54.75-56.10 and 2.110-10.210 respectively from January-April. Nitrogen free extract (1.890-11.850) with no significance from Feb- Mar(P> 0.05) but was significantly varied in the month of Jan . Crude protein (26.75-28.00) with no significant variation from Jan-April, the Dry matter(43.87-45.25) no significance from Feb-Mar but varied significantly in the month Jan. Microbial examination result reveal the presence of both beneficial (Bacillus subtilis) and pathogenical microbes (Aspergillus niger). The fungi count for warashowed no significant difference between January, February, and April, but a significant difference in April compared to the other months; the bacterial count for warashowed no significant difference between April, January, and February, but a significant difference in March compared to the other months; the fungi isolates were identified as belonging to the Ascomycete, Saccharomycetee, Phycomycetes, and Ascomycetes classes, with specific species like Aspergillus niger, yeast, Mucor, Neurospora, and Sclerotionium; the bacterial isolates were identified as Klebsiella pneumonia and Bacillus subtilis, with the latter testing positive for catalase and citrate, but negative for oxidase and urease, and positive for lactase but negative for hydrogen sulfide gas. The fungi count for wara collected across the month of January,-April ranged 2.40 to 201.60 x106 cfu/mL, the bacterial count for the wara collected for Okada across Jan-April ranged are 6.20-117.00 x106 cfu/ml .In conclusion, the microbiological load of the wara samples was below the (FDA) Food and Drug Administration's approved levels (100,000 cfu/mL of bacteria in wara), thus they can be consumed, and the load can be further lowered through stringent hygienic standards. I recommend that steps in the manufacturing of wara be thoroughly examined, particularly in terms of hygiene in the processing, handling, and packing of wara.
