General Microbiological Quality of Ice Cream and Ice Pop Sold in Gaborone, Botswana

The study was aimed at investigating the microbial quality of ice cream and ice pop sold in Gaborone. From the study, a variety of microorganisms were isolated. The population of bacteria was found to increase from the open ice cream samples while the pre-packed ice cream had a lower population of bacteria. The types of microorganisms were both mesophilic and psychrotrophic. The population of mesophiles in open ice cream ranged between 3.30 log(10)CFU/g and 6.78 log(10) CFU/g. The psychrotrophs in the same food samples ranged between 2.0 log(10) CFU/g and 6.70 log(10) CFU/g. These values were found to exceed the acceptable microbiological standard. The results for packed ice cream had lower counts of microbes (ranging between 2.48 and 5.48 log(10) CFU/g), with only one sample out of 150 having a log count above the microbiological standard of 4.0 log(10) CFU/g.