Physical-Chemical Characterization of Cocoa Oil Subjected to an Accelerated Fermentation Process

This article presents the physical-chemical characterization of cocoa oil fermented in two ways: the traditional way, which is commonly done in the field and takes about 7 days to complete the fermentation process; and the accelerated way, in which a probiotic bacterium called kefir was added to the fermentation process, which hastened the process and made the bean ferment much faster. Research has been carried out on the accelerated fermentation process to reduce its time, but no analysis has been made on the physicochemical characterization of the cocoa oil after the process. For this reason, the following analyses were performed: density by pycnometer, acidity index, peroxide value, refractive index, saponification index and the percentage of loss by heating. These analyses showed that the oil sample fermented with the lactobacillus has more fat content which makes it ideal for the cosmetics sector, but at the same time it has more acid properties in its composition according to the other analyses, this means that its application in the food sector is not very recommendable since it would affect the quality of the products.