RIPENING CHEESE.

Temuka Leader, Volume I, Issue 99, 27 November 1878, Page 3

RIPENING CHEESE.

'! The art of cheese-making is ranch belter understood than the art of curing cheese after it is made, and I believe that twice the quantity of cheese is injured in flavour while curing, than there is by any defect in its manufacture It is not at all difficult to find rooms in which cheese has ripened varying in temperature more than SOdeg. ; a variation four times greater than ever ought to be allowed. From experiments which I have made, I have fixed upon that of 72deg. as the most favourable. But where the cheese is ripened for early use, and not to be kept over three months, a temperature of from 75 to SOdeg. may not pr"ve injurious to the flavour. Cheese designed for long keeping should be ripened at a temperature not above 75deg., or below 65. ; and tht! widest range of tempei-ature allowable for cheese while undergoing the ripening process is, in my opinion, from 60 to •80oeg. The three agents in cheese-mak-ing—rennet, heat, and salt—either accelerate or retard the ripening of the cheese to a greater extent than is generally supposed. If the milk from which the cheese is made is coagulated in thirty minutes—that is, sufficient rennet used to produce cosigulaiion in that time—salted light!} 7 , and kept at a temperature of 75deg., the ehee e will ripen in thirty days, and be in bett-r flavour and in better condition for use when from forty to thirty days o'd than it ever will be after. The rule holds good with cheese as well as with fruit—'Soon ripe, soon rotten.' Again, when a sma 1 quantity of rennet is used, the curd highly salted, and kept at a low temperature, the cheese will continue to improve for twelve or fifteen months, and retain its flavour witiiout much deterioration for a long time after. Hence I draw the following conclusions : First, the less the quantity of rennet, the greater quantity of salt used, and the lower the temperature, the slower the cheese will ripen ; second, the greater the quantity of rennet, the less the quantity of salt, and the higher Mie temperature, the sooner the cheese wil 1 ripen. I would not advise making short-lived cheese, except in localities where it will be consumed near by, and the demand always equal to, if not greater than, the supply. Our cheeses will always be likely to go wrong, and our heavy losses continue, until, by the construction of our curingrooms, we are enabled to control the temperature of the cheese while curing." —' H. L., Gloucestershire.'