68 



The Country Gentleniaii s Magazine 



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THE CURING OF CHEESE. 



IN an address before the Ontario Dairy- 

 mens' Convention recently, Mr A. 

 Willard, the president, made the following re- 

 marks in the course of his address : — 



The great question for the attention of 

 American Dairymen to 'day is -the proper 

 curing of cheese upon the shelf. The subject 

 has been almost entirely ignored by our dairy 

 associations and by the dairymen of America. 

 The curing of cheese has as much to do in 

 securing fine flavour and quality as the mani- 

 pulations of the milk and curd. 



A well-made cheese when removed from 

 the press to the cheese room, contains a 

 certain amount of moisture, a part of vvhich 

 must pass off in the ripening process, or the 

 cheese will not acquire good flavour. If 

 the cheese is kept in a damp or badly ven- 

 tilated place, the excess of moisture will 

 develop another class of fungi, a different 

 kind of fermentation than that required for 

 good cheese. From experiments made, it 

 has been found that 2000 lb. of newly 

 made cheese will give out nearly 2 lb. of 

 moisture during twenty-four hours, and 

 the sooner the room is cleansed of such mois- 

 ture the better ; for if it is condensed and 

 falls backupon the older cheese, or the cheese 

 is constantly saturated with these exhala- 

 tions, it will injure the flavour. We 

 turn newly made cheese daily, in order 

 that this moisture may readily pass off", and 

 the fermentation of the cheese be carried 

 away in a uniform manner. Ample ventila- 

 tion then is important — ventilation that shall 

 carry off the fumes of decay and cheesy ex- 

 halations. From a large number of well con- 

 ducted experiments, the principle has been 

 established that a temperature of about 70 

 deg. is the best for curing well made cheese ; 



to secure fine flavour and a rich mellow tex- 

 ture as well as long keeping qualities, the 

 growth of the fungi, or fermentation, must be 

 slow and uniform. You may force it forward 

 by high heat and light salting, but always at 

 the expense of long keeping qualities. The 

 system of preparing cheese for market at 

 twenty days' old is a most pernicious sys- 

 tem, and is the source of fearful losses to • 

 American dairymen every year. 



It is admissible only when you know where 

 to place your goods and know they are to go 

 into immediate consumption. In 1866, I saw 

 the result of such manufacture in numerous 

 instances — cheese that come in good con- 

 dition, and if sold at once would command 

 76s. ; in a week's time so fell in flavour 

 that it went begging at 50s. I know that 

 American dairymen and American dealers 

 often boast of our system, because we can 

 make cheese that is so soon ready for market 

 that the shelves can be cleaned from month 

 to month, but they do not couple it with the 

 fact that much of our cheese sells in England 

 for 30s. to 40s. the cwt., and even less. 

 Som.e one loses on these goods, for no cheese 

 of good flavour, that can be held, would be 

 sold at such a fearful loss. 



I believe that a good many old curing 

 houses could be improved by building around 

 an inside wall, leaving 6 or 8 inches space 

 between it and the present wall, and by ar- 

 ranging double windows. It has been sug- 

 gested that saw-dust or some non-conducting 

 substance be placed between the walls. I 

 saw something of this recently in Ohio. It 

 was a storehouse for keeping late made 

 cheese, after it was cured, during the winter. 

 Messrs Horr & Warren, of WeUington, have 

 a storehouse of this description, where, on 



