Abstract: Fermentation, an old and economical method to produce and preserve foods, is widely used all over the world. Fermented foods make an important contribution to human health. With the development of fermentation technology, the safety of fermented foods has gain extensive attention. This article provides a review of the classification of fermented foods and the assessment of their health benefits, quality and safety. Modern microbiological risk assessment (MRA) is one of the extensively used techniques for target statement, hazard identification, exposure assessment, hazard characterization and risk characterization and allows to evaluate the food safety of fermented foods in a more reliable and consistent way.

Key words: fermented foods, classification, health benefit, safety risk, quality and safety assessment, microbiological risk assessment