Probiotic and Synbiotic Chocolate

Chocolate is a mixture of cocoa by-products, sucrose, and milk solids dispersed in the fat phase (mainly cocoa butter). It consists of an excellent probiotic matrix due to its low water activity and the considerable presence of fat and antioxidant compounds. The Lactobacillus, Lacticaseibacillus, Limosilactobacillus, Bifidobacterium, and Streptococcus comprehend the most applied genus in probiotic chocolate. Its processing involves the same steps as the traditional chocolate (blending, refining, conching, tempering, molding, cooling, and storage), with the additional step of probiotic inoculation. In most cases, a single Direct Vac Set probiotic inoculum, which consists of a freeze-dried cell concentrate, can be added and homogenized directly into the melted chocolate. Inoculation has to take place after the conching process to ensure cell viability. Currently, there is not a defined general amount of bacteria to be introduced into the food to ensure the probiotic health benefits. It must be proven for each strain and inoculum tested. But in general, cell concentrations between 106 and 1013 CFU/g are being used to ensure the probiotic claim. Furthermore, there is a current controversy over functional chocolate such as the probiotic options due to their high sugar content. This has motivated researchers and food industries to produce sugar-free and reduced-sugar options. Considering that some sugar substitute ingredients can act as prebiotics, promoting the growth of probiotic microorganisms, the combination of prebiotic and probiotic functionality originated the synbiotic chocolate. Its production also involves the probiotic inoculation step besides the traditional stages of chocolate processing, but instead of sugar, the prebiotic and other sugar-replacer ingredients are added, usually into the blending step with the other main ingredients. Therefore, considering the growing literature involving this theme, the objective of this protocol is to provide up-to-date and detailed information for the production of different types of probiotic and synbiotic chocolate.