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Fermented milk from Colombia

Kumis (Colombian)kumis

Colombian kumis is a creamy, sour, slightly fizzy cow-milk drink, named after Central Asian koumiss but made from cow milk. At home raw whole milk is back-slopped and left two to three days, then sweetened with cane sugar and cinnamon. Dairy kumis is defined in Colombian law as milk set by Streptococcus lactis or cremoris.

Fully documentedFermented milk2 days – 3 days

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedHousehold practice with no fixed amounts; the Colombian resolution sets composition, not a recipe.
Whole cow milkRaw in the artisanal product; hygienised (pasteurised) for dairy kumis[jimenez2022][res2310]
Kumis from an earlier batchLiquid back-slopped starter in home kumis[jimenez2022]
Cane sugar and cinnamonAdded before serving[jimenez2022]
Starterbackslop (artisanal); Streptococcus lactis or cremoris cultures in dairies

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

Start
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What changes: Whole cow milk is set aside for souring

Step 1 of 4
Pour the milk into the vessel
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactic acid bacteria
Streptococcus lactis
Geotrichum
L. plantarum
Enterococcus faecalis

Output: milk for souring.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

raw-milk flora at home; hygienised milk in dairies

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

Colombian kumis is a creamy, sour, slightly fizzy cow-milk drink, named after Central Asian koumiss but made from cow milk. At home raw whole milk is back-slopped and left two to three days, then sweetened with cane sugar and cinnamon. Dairy kumis is defined in Colombian law as milk set by Streptococcus lactis or cremoris. Made in 4 steps over 2 days – 3 days. The longest step, add old kumis and leave to ferment, takes 2–3 days (Jimenez M.E 2022) and runs at 28 °C (Chaves-López C 2017). Streptococcus lactis or S. cremoris (now Lactococcus lactis and L. cremoris), required in dairy kumis and Galactomyces geotrichum, Lactiplantibacillus plantarum and Enterococcus faecalis, among the commonest microbes of artisanal kumis do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step2–3 daysReported[jimenez2022]Add old kumis and leave to ferment
Temperature28 °CReported[chaves2017]Add old kumis and leave to ferment

What makes this one different

Colombian kumis shares a name with mare's-milk koumiss but is cow milk soured by lactic bacteria and yeasts such as Galactomyces geotrichum. It is sweetened, often with cinnamon, and only lightly alcoholic.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Dairy kumisHygienised milk set with S. lactis or S. cremoris; whole, semi-skimmed or skimmed, with or without sugar.
  • Long-life kumisKumis ultra-pasteurised after fermentation (leche fermentada larga vida).

Safety

Artisanal kumis is made from raw milk. In 13 traditional samples, 30 of 72 enterococcus isolates carried genes linked to virulence (Chaves-López 2011). The other 42 carried none, and the strains made no histamine in 48 h of milk fermentation. The 1986 resolution required dairy kumis to be phosphatase-negative and set limits for coliforms and yeasts and moulds; that article was repealed by Resolution 1407 of 2022. The CDC says raw milk and products made from it can carry germs such as Campylobacter, Cryptosporidium, E. coli, Listeria, Brucella and Salmonella, and that children under 5, adults over 65, pregnant women and people with weakened immune systems are at higher risk of serious illness.

Hazards the sources name: Enterococcus isolates carrying virulence-associated genes (30 of 72 isolates from 13 traditional samples).

History and sources

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

Colombia's Ministry of Health classed kumis as one of four fermented milks in Resolución 2310 of 1986. Its composition article was later repealed by Resolución 1407 of 2022.

  1. [res2310] Ministerio de Salud de Colombia, Resolución 2310 de 1986 (articles 10, 14–16 and the shelf-life table; article 16 repealed by Resolución 1407 de 2022), INVIMA normogramaspec
  2. [jimenez2022] Jimenez M.E., O'Donovan C.M., de Ullivarri M.F., Cotter P.D. 2022, Microorganisms present in artisanal fermented food from South America, Frontiers in Microbiology 13:941866 (review, citing Chaves-López et al. 2011)paper
  3. [chaves2017] Chaves-López C., Serio A., Rossi C., Pepe A., Compagnone E., Paparella A. 2017, Interaction between Galactomyces geotrichum KL20B, Lactobacillus plantarum LAT3 and Enterococcus faecalis KE06 during milk fermentation, Fermentation 3(4):52 (abstract)paper
  4. [chaves2012] Chaves-López C., Tofalo R., Serio A., Paparella A., Sacchetti G., Suzzi G. 2012, Yeasts from Colombian kumis as source of peptides with angiotensin I converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitory activity in milk, International Journal of Food Microbiology 159(1):39–46 (abstract)paper
  5. [chaves2011] Chaves-López C., Serio A., Martuscelli M., Paparella A., Osorio-Cadavid E., Suzzi G. 2011, Microbiological characteristics of kumis, a traditional fermented Colombian milk, with particular emphasis on enterococci population, Food Microbiology 28(5):1041–1047 (abstract)paper
  6. [cdc-rawmilk] US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Raw Milkgov