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Fermented milk from Ghana, Nigeria, Burkina Faso and other parts of West Africa

Nunu (West African soured milk)nunu

Nunu is a yoghurt-like soured milk from Ghana and its neighbours, made only from raw cow's milk. The milk is left in a calabash or other container at room temperature for one to two days, and wild lactic bacteria and yeasts sour it. No starter culture is used; the container and old stock from earlier ferments carry the microbes. It is drunk alone or with fura millet balls.

Fully documentedFermented milk2 days – 3 days

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedHome production with no fixed amounts; the milk is simply collected into a container and left to sour.
Fresh raw cow's milkNunu is made only from cow's milk, not goat, sheep or camel milk[akabanda2014]
Old stock from earlier ferments (no starter culture)Old stock and the fermentation container are used to start each new batch[akabanda2014]
Starterspontaneous (backslopping through old stock and the container)

Total time across the recorded steps: 2 days – 3 days

Start
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What changes: Starting material: fresh raw cow's milk in a calabash

Step 1 of 5
Collect the fresh raw milk into a container
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
L. fermentum
L. plantarum
Leuconostoc
Yeasts

Output: raw milk in the fermenting vessel.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Nunu is a yoghurt-like soured milk from Ghana and its neighbours, made only from raw cow's milk. The milk is left in a calabash or other container at room temperature for one to two days, and wild lactic bacteria and yeasts sour it. No starter culture is used; the container and old stock from earlier ferments carry the microbes. It is drunk alone or with fura millet balls. Made in 5 steps over 2 days – 3 days. The longest step, leave the milk to sour at room temperature, takes 24 h – 2 days (Akabanda F 2014). Limosilactobacillus (Lactobacillus) fermentum, dominant throughout the fermentation and Lactiplantibacillus plantarum and Leuconostoc mesenteroides, prominent in the first 6–8 h do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step24 h – 2 daysReported[akabanda2014][walsh2017]Leave the milk to sour at room temperature
Temperature60 °CReported[akabanda2014]Heat the milk (starter-culture trial)
AciditypH 6.5 → 3.72Measured[akabanda2014]Ferment with a nunu starter (trial)

What makes this one different

Nunu is soured from raw cow's milk alone, with no boiling and no starter culture, so the container and old stock set the microbes, and L. fermentum rather than yoghurt bacteria leads.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Starter-culture nunuMilk heated to 60 °C for 30 min (the study calls this pasteurised) fermented at 35 °C with L. fermentum, L. plantarum or L. helveticus starters from nunu cut the fermentation time (Akabanda et al. 2014).

Safety

Nunu is made from raw milk with an uncontrolled fermentation. Metagenomic study found putatively pathogenic E. coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae in some samples, and frequent bovine-gut bacteria. The starter trial calls 60 °C for 30 minutes pasteurising, but the US legal definition starts at 63 °C for 30 minutes, so that heating cannot be relied on to make raw milk safe.

Hazards the sources name: Putatively pathogenic Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae in some samples, with frequent bovine-gut bacteria.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

History
The sources we found do not record its history.
  1. [akabanda2013] Akabanda F. et al. 2013, Taxonomic and molecular characterization of lactic acid bacteria and yeasts in nunu, a Ghanaian fermented milk product, Food Microbiology 34(2):277–283 (abstract)paper
  2. [akabanda2014] Akabanda F., Owusu-Kwarteng J., Tano-Debrah K., Parkouda C., Jespersen L. 2014, The use of lactic acid bacteria starter culture in the production of nunu, a spontaneously fermented milk product in Ghana, International Journal of Food Science 2014:721067 (read via Europe PMC full text, PMC4745485)paper
  3. [walsh2017] Walsh A.M. et al. 2017, Strain-level metagenomic analysis of the fermented dairy beverage nunu highlights potential food safety risks, Applied and Environmental Microbiology 83(16):e01144-17paper
  4. [cfr-1240-61] US Code of Federal Regulations, 21 CFR 1240.61, Mandatory pasteurization for milk and milk productsgov