CHAPTER XVII 



Milk Constituents and Yield of Cheese 



The relation of the composition of milk to yield 

 of cheese is a subject of the highest practical in- 

 terest and importance to cheese-makers. Compara- 

 tively little was known about it previous to 1892, 

 because attention had been completely absorbed by 

 the merely mechanical methods of cheese-making. 

 We were completely in the dark in regard to such 

 fundamental facts as the relation of fat and casein 

 in milk to yield of cheese, the character and extent 

 of losses of milk constituents in cheese-making, 

 their causes and remedies, and, in general, the de- 

 tailed relations existing between cheese and the 

 material from which it is made. So profound was 

 the ignorance regarding milk constituents and their 

 relation to yield of cheese that it was very gener- 

 ally believed that the same amount of cheese was 

 made from 100 pounds of milk in the case of the 

 milks of different herds. We now have on hand an 

 immense mass of data, the accumulated results of 

 the investigation work of our American experiment 

 stations, and these data enable us to reach ver}^ 

 definite, positive and final conclusions. 



The amount of fresh or green cheese produced by 

 100 pounds of milk depends upon three factors : 



i (i) The percentage of fat and of casein in milk. 

 / (2) The percentage of fat and of casein lost in 

 cheese-making. 



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