Among the species of native edible fruit from the cerrado (Brazilian savannah), “cagaita” or “cagaiteira” (Eugenia dysenterica DC) is highly appreciated by the local population. The cagaiteira tree belongs to the Myrtaceae family. The tree can reach up to 10 m in height and has twisted branches and thick bark and the fructification period occurs between October and December. The fruits of the cagaita offer nutrients and attractive sensory characteristics such as colour, flavour and aroma, but they are not exploited commercially on a large scale. Cagaita's distribution in the cerrado is very broad, occurring in the States of Bahia, Goiás, Maranhão, Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul, Minas Gerais, Pará, Piauí, São Paulo, Tocantins and Distrito Federal.The cagaiteira is relatively well adapted to poor soils, which are often found in Cerradão (Brazilian savannah) and cerrado (Andrade, Cunha, Souza, Reis, & Almeida, 2003). The fruits are tasty, rich in vitamin C and have wide regional acceptance. They can be eaten fresh and their pulp is used for making jams, jellies, ice cream and juices (Genovese, da Silva Pinto, Gonçalves, & Lajolo, 2008). Many studies have demonstrated the feasibility of using tropical fruits such as cajá (Dias, Schwan, & Lima, 2003), cacao (Dias, Schwan, Freire, & Serôdio, 2007), gabiroba (Duarte, Dias, Pereira, Gervásio, & Schwan, 2009), umbu, jabuticaba and cupuassu (Duarte, Dias, Oliveira, Teixeira, et al., 2010) to produce alcoholic beverages. The fermentation process for beverage elaboration depends on the action of yeast to convert the sugars into alcohol, esters and other volatile and non-volatile compounds. Due to differences in fruit composition, the yeast strains used for fermentation must adapt to different environments (e.g., sugar composition and concentration and the presence of organic acids) (Duarte et al., 2009).
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