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Fermented foods are within the food products more often complained of having caused biogenic amines poisoning. Concerning milk-based fermented foods, cheese is the main product likely to contain significant levels of biogenic amines, specially tyramine, histamine and putrescine. Prompted by the increasing awareness of the risks related to dietary uptake of high biogenic amine loads, in this review we report about cheese elaboration and processing technological aspects affecting biogenic amines levels. Synthesis of biogenic amines is possible only when three conditions converge: i) availability of the substrate amino acids; ii) presence of microorganisms with the appropriate catabolic pathway activated; and iii) environmental conditions favorable to the decarboxilation activity. These conditions depend on several factors such as milk treatment (pasteurization), use of starter cultures, NaCl concentration, time and temperature of ripening and preservation, pH… which will be discussed in this chapter.

Biogenic amines in wine represent a toxicological risk for the health of the consumer, with several trade implications. In this study 26 strains of Lactobacillus plantarum were analysed for their ability to degrade biogenic amines commonly found during wine fermentation. Two strains of L. plantarum were selected in reason of their ability to degrade putrescine and tyramine. The degradation was assessed in vitro, both in presence of the biogenic amines and in presence of the specific chemical precursor and of producer bacteria. The two L. plantarum biotypes were found capable to work synergically. In addition, the survival in wine-like medium and the aptitude to degrade malic acid after alcoholic fermentation of the selected L. plantarum strains was analysed. Our results suggest the potential application of wine L. plantarum strains to design malolactic starter cultures able to degrade biogenic amines in wine.