Mississippi's Microbe: The Mississippi Mud Pie

Mississippi’s Microbe In developing a microbe to represent Mississippi best, one must ponder the item most important to many Mississippians—food. For some the food of choice may be a juicy steak; but for others, the favorite part of any dinner is dessert. Those in search of the best desserts of every state choose to come to Mississippi for the “Mississippi Mud Pie,” also known as the “Muddy Mississippi Cake” (Penn; “Mississippi”).
The “Mississippi Mud Pie” is a tasty treat composed of three tiers: a cookie crust base, a middle layer of chocolate cake, and a chocolate pudding topping (“Mississippi”). On average, a typical American will ingest twelve pounds of chocolate each year; and without the microbe Kloeckera apis, consumers would not be able to enjoy the pleasures of chocolate at all (“Chocolate Facts”; Ardhana). Most importantly, without chocolate, Mississippians would never have the opportunity to enjoy the famous “Mississippi Mud
An important aspect of cocoa seed fermentation includes specific yeasts that cultivate ethanol and produce enzymes to degrade peptin (Schwan). This is important for setting up additional fermentation by bacteria. The main yeast present in the beginning of fermentation is Kloeckera apis which accounts for roughly seventy to ninety percent of the total yeast population (Ardhana). As previously stated, Kloeckera apis is a yeast or yeast-like organism with the full classification as follows: Fungi, Ascomycota, Saccharomycotina, Saccharomycetes, Saccharomycetidae, Saccharomycetales, Saccharomycodaceae, Kloeckera (Smith). The morphology of the colonies of Kloeckera apis exhibit an irregular shape, low convex elevation, and undulate edges. They are beige in color with an opaque texture. Individual cells of Kloeckera apis are elliptical in shape; these cells undergo bipolar budding and produce sexual ascospores