Feasibility of Using Catalase Activity as an Index of Microbial Loads on Chicken Surfaces

The Catalasemeter with membrane filter method was tested to quantitate the catalase activity of laboratory cultures as well as swab samples from cold‐stored (7°C) chicken as measurements of microbial activity. Catalasemeter reading (flotation time in sec) is inversely proportional to total number of catalase producing bacteria. Good correlation (r =−0.93) was obtained between Catalasemeter and both viable cell population and psychrotroph population of cold‐stored chicken. For good quality cold‐stored chicken (<10 3 CFU/cm 2 ), the flotation time was longer than 4,200 sec; and in the case of poor quality cold‐stored chicken (>10 6 CFU/cm 2 ), the flotaton time was less than 580 sec. This provides a guideline for rapidly estimating microbial loads in cold‐stored chicken.