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Fermented milk from Egypt, Sudan

Zabadiزبادي

Zabadi (zabady) is the set yoghurt of Egypt and Sudan. In the traditional Near East method the milk is heated to 80–90 °C for 30 minutes, seeded with a pure culture or the previous day's yoghurt and set for 2 to 3 hours at 42–45 °C; in Egypt it is made from buffalo or cow milk, alone or mixed.

Fully documentedFermented milk2.5 h – 3.5 h

Recipe

Zabadi, a photo from Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Rainer Zenz, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
No fixed amounts recordedFAO gives temperatures, times and the starter rate, not a batch size.
Cow, sheep, goat or buffalo milkFAO says the milk depends on what is available; for Egyptian zabady a review lists buffalo, cow, alone or mixed[fao-tmp][afr26]
Yoghurt from the previous day, or a pure cultureFAO prints the rate as 2.3% of the milk[fao-tmp]
Starterbackslop from the previous day's zabadi, or a pure Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus culture

Total time across the recorded steps: 2.5 h – 3.5 h

Start
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80–90 °C

What changes: The milk is held at 80–90 °C for 30 minutes, then cooled

Step 1 of 4
Heat the milk
Time
30 min
Reported
Temperature
80–90 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
S. thermophilus
Lactococcus garvieae
Lactococcus lactis
L. raffinolactis

Output: hot milk.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

heat kills most of the milk's own flora

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

Zabadi (zabady) is the set yoghurt of Egypt and Sudan. In the traditional Near East method the milk is heated to 80–90 °C for 30 minutes, seeded with a pure culture or the previous day's yoghurt and set for 2 to 3 hours at 42–45 °C; in Egypt it is made from buffalo or cow milk, alone or mixed. Made in 4 steps over 2.5 h – 3.5 h. The longest step, set warm, takes 2–3 h (FAO 1990) and runs at 42–45 °C (FAO 1990). Streptococcus thermophilus, the main species, followed by Lactococcus garvieae and Lactococcus lactis and Lactococcus raffinolactis do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step2–3 hReported[fao-tmp][afr26]Set warm
Temperature42–45 °CReported[fao-tmp]Set warm

What makes this one different

Traditional Egyptian zabady carries lactococci such as Lactococcus garvieae beside S. thermophilus, so its flora is wider than a two-strain industrial yoghurt.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Sudanese zabadiGoat or cow milk, backslopped and set for 12–15 h.

Safety

The milk is heated to 80–90 °C before seeding, and the finished zabadi keeps up to 7 days at 5 °C.

History and sources

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

FAO's survey says Near East yoghurt originated from central Asian and Mediterranean countries, mainly Turkey, Lebanon, Bulgaria and Romania.

  1. [fao-tmp] FAO 1990, The technology of traditional milk products in developing countries, Animal Production and Health Paper 85, section II 4.6 (yoghurt, laban, zabady of the Near East)gov
  2. [el-baradei2008] El-Baradei G., Delacroix-Buchet A., Ogier J.C. 2008, Bacterial biodiversity of traditional Zabady fermented milk, International Journal of Food Microbiology 121(3):295–301 (abstract)paper
  3. [afr26] Nodem Sohanang F.S. et al. 2026, Unlocking the microbial potential of traditional African fermented milk products, a systematic review, Frontiers in Food Science and Technology 6:1847264 (Sudanese zabadi, citing Eissa et al. 2011)paper