366 FOOD AND NUTRITION 



405. Cheese. Both cheese and butter have been used by 

 pastoral people for ages. Abraham set butter and milk before 

 his guests. When a lad, David was sent by his father with 

 cheeses for the captain of the company in which his brothers 

 were serving in the army of Israel. Cheese is the fermented 

 CURD of milk. When milk sours, the CASEIN (curd) of the milk 

 separates from the watery portion called the WHEY. The 

 curd contains nearly all of the food substance in the milk except 

 the sugar. The curd may also be produced by adding RENNET 

 to the milk. Rennet is extracted from the stomachs of calves. 

 The curd is separated from the whey and then pressed to remove 

 as much of the fluid substance as possible. The pressed mate- 

 rial is then allowed to ripen in a properly prepared room. 

 During the ripening process the different constituents of the 

 curd undergo certain chemical changes, largely caused by 

 bacteria, producing the flavor and odor of cheese. If the 

 cheese is made from whole milk the product is called FULL 

 CREAM CHEESE. The composition of this kind of cheese is 

 given in Table XIV. It will be noticed that cheese still con- 

 tains a considerable amount of water but much less than whole 

 milk (Fig. 256). In a sense then, cheese may be looked upon 

 as a sort of condensed-milk product. In some cases, the valu- 

 able milk fat is removed from the milk 

 before making cheese. In this case 

 cheaper animal or vegetable fats, as neu- 

 tral and cotton seed oil products, are 

 put in to compensate for the milk fat 

 removed. Such cheese is known as 

 FILLED CHEESE. Its manufacture is 

 regulated by law as in the case of but- 

 FIG. 256. Composition terine, and the consumer is supposed to 

 be informed that he is buying filled and 

 not full cream cheese. When good fats are used as substitutes 

 for the milk fat, filled cheese is wholesome and nutritious. 



