The purpose of this study is to produce probiotic Lavash bread using probiotic Lactobacillus plantarum PTCC 1896 with gelatin and sodium carboxymethyl cellulose (SCMC) coating. Probiotic Lavash bread was produced with a microencapsulation containing Lactobacillus plantarum PTCC 1896, which was made with 10% w/w gelatin solution and 0.5% w/w carboxymethyl cellulose sodium salt, based on spray drying method. The results of probiotic survival studies showed that the combination of 10% gelatin and 0.5% SCMC and spray drying method could maintain a significant amount of bacterial viability (P 0.05). The moisture content of microcapsules was 5.86 ± 0.25 which is suitable for survival of probiotics and the particle size was 3.93 ± 0.33. The microbial gelatin-SCMC conserved the bacterial survival in simulated gastrointestinal conditions, and after 2 and 4 hours of gastric and intestinal fluid storage, the survival was 8.70 and 7.92 logarithmic cycles respectively. Bread tissue test showed that the force required to pierce the probiotic bread was higher than that of the control batch. Colorimetric results showed that in the presence of gelatin and SCMC, the indexes L* and b* decreased and the index a* increased (P 0.05). Sensory evaluation indicated that the overall acceptance of control treatment was better than probiotic bread. Generally, it can be concluded that SCMC- gelatin coating can be used as a suitable coating of Lactobacillus plantarum PTCC 1896, and the resulting bread is similar to that of ordinary breadonly difference that it has beneficial was the taste of the bread containing microencapsulated probiotic using such as the use of dried vegetable powder, which requires more laboratory testing. Key Words: Lactobacillus plantarum PTCC 1896, Edible Coatings, Gelatin, SCMC, Spray Dryer.
