FARMERS' REGISTER— ON MAKING CHEESE. 



721 



having too much Ufjht. But in dairies where the 

 buililiiiirs are rightly fittetl up, a store-house, 

 having a moderate portion ol" air, httle light, and 

 neither damp nor very dry, should be built near to 

 the dairy-house, and the cheeses })laced there on 

 wooden shelves. The sun nmst not be allowed 

 to shine on the ciieeses in the store-house. 



Cheeses are never sweated in Scotland, as is 

 common in the English dairies; neither are they 

 ever stored above the cow-houses to receive the 

 breath ot" the cows to contract a particular flavor. 

 Heating them till they throw oft' part of tlieir fat, 

 can never make them richer or oC finer flavor, but 

 the reverse. 



But after all that can bs done, cheeses which 

 are made in the same way fi-om the milk of the 

 same cows, and every operation performed alike, 

 will diller considerably in quahty and flavor. This 

 diversity is greater in the Scots than in the Eng- 

 lish cheese, owing probably to the Ibrmer being 

 made in ill constructed houses, and with imperfect 

 apparatus, while in England the dairies are large, 

 the dairy-houses of superior formation, and the 

 operations more uniK)rmly conducted. Milk is 

 more easily contaminated with the slightest impu- 

 rities than any other substance in common use. 

 It is fortunate that, while there are diversities in 

 the qualities and flavor of cheese, there are also 

 diversities! in the taste of its consumers. 



Scots cheeses are never formed of a round sltape 

 hke cannon balls, as some of the Dutch are; they 

 are rounded on the edges, and flat on the sides; 

 and the greatest part of them are from 15 lbs. to 

 50 lbs. avoirdupois in weight, many of them hea- 

 vier. Cheeses of these weights do not readily 

 become tough, dry, and horny, and they of course 

 do not contain so large a proj)ortion of crust, as 

 small cheeses. 



Scottisli cheese does not swell so readily as the 

 Cheshire and Dutch cheese. That defect does 

 not proceed from the clover or other particular 

 food given to the cows, as some have imagined, 

 but is produced by the introduction of impure air 

 into the milk or curd, or from impure rennet. The 

 extraordinary breaking of the curd in the Dutch 

 dairies, and the skewering of the English cheese, 

 described by Mr. Holland, cannot fail to introduce 

 flatulent air into the curd and cheese, and produce 

 swelling. Pungency of taste probably proceeds 

 from the same causes. Coloring cheese with 

 arnotto has been practised by some cheesemakers 

 in Scotland, but the practice has never become 

 general, and is not now so common as formerly. 

 Arnotto is a harmless article, but as it has a ten- 

 dency to dry the cheese too much, and can do no 

 good, it may well be considered as a needless ap- 

 plication. The cheeses made in Scotland are 

 neither washed, nor rubbed, nor greased, on the 

 outside, nor painted like some of the Dutch and 

 English cheeses; but merely laid up to dry on 

 clean boards, in a place neither dry nor damp, and 

 turned over; and yet they are free of" cracks or 

 mouldiness on their crust. Cracks proceed either 

 from the milk having become sour before the 

 cheese was made, or from the cheeses being ex- 

 posed to too much drought when laid up to dry; 

 and mouldiness proceeds from their being kept in a 

 place that is too damp. Blistering or whey- 

 springs are seldom seen in Scottish cheese. 



The Dunlop cheese is generally not so acrid in 

 the taste as most of the JEnglish cheese, nor is it 



Vol. 11—56 



so hard and dry as that of Holland; it isf;ofterand 

 Hitter than citlu'r. A tasting of tlie higii-fiavored 

 English or fijreign cheese, after a good dinner, 

 may please as a relish better than the softer and 

 milder Scottish cheese; but when a quantity of 

 cheese is to be eaten at luiicheon, or a Welch rab- 

 bit is desired for supper, it is prelijrableto the Eng- 

 lish, which not untrcquently aif'ects the ollaclory 

 nerve. Some interior cheeses are unavoidably 

 made, in even the best managed dairies; and both 

 farmers and cheesemongers may, at times, j.'alm 

 inferior cheese on those who cannot judge for 

 themselves. In making this species of" cheese, 

 the average return is one stone of 16 lbs. of 24 oz. 

 to the pound, fi'om every GO Scottish |;intsof milk, 

 which nearly corresponds to 179 imjierial pints. 

 Dunlop cheese has nevertheless been much im- 

 proved in the course of the last twenty years, and 

 the demand for it is steadily mcreasing. 



Skim-milk cheese has been made in Britain 

 ever since the Romans taught our ancestors the 

 art of cheese-making. The mode of making it 

 does not diflisr much from the way of making full- 

 milk cheese, as described above. The milk is in 

 Scotland generally allowed to remain from thirty- 

 six to fbrty-eightJiours in the coolers, in order to 

 cast up the whole cream. This is the greatest de- 

 fect in the dairy husbandry. It would be better 

 not to allow the milk to stand more than twenty- 

 four hours, as is usually done in the Dutch dairies. 

 By taking oil" the cream at ei<rhteen or twenty- 

 lour hours, a smaller quantity of butter is of course 

 obtained, but it is of superior quality; and the 

 skim- milk by having a part of the "fat, and not 

 being too lono; exposed to the air, is richer for 

 cheese than when the milk is exposed in the cool- 

 ers for thirty-six or forty-eight hours. Skim-milk 

 coagulates readily. The whey comes freely off 

 the curd, and the cheese is easily formed and 

 pressed. 



The whey taken from milk when made into 

 cheese, is partly used by work people as a drink, 

 or made into porridge with oat-meal, but the most 

 of it is given to horses, cows, and swine. The 

 whey from the milk of three cows will, with a 

 small supply of other food, raise a pig of the value 

 of 10s. or 12s. in April to the weight of 15 or 20 

 stones by December. Some have boasted of col- 

 lecting butter from whey. It has been shown 

 that when the operations of cheese-making are 

 rightly conducted, no butter worthy of attention 

 can ever be procured from whey, except through 

 gross mismanagement in the making of cheese. 



The rennet in general use is formed from the 

 gastric juice of anhnals, particularly that found in 

 the stomachs of calves, hares, pouUry, &c. Va- 

 rious other substances, as acids, alcohol, sugar, 

 and the juices of several species of vegetables, 

 will coagiilate milk; but as the stomachs of calves 

 form the most abundant and pou-erful coagulum 

 yet known, scarcely any other is ever used. 



Rennet is prepared in various ways by different 

 people. Mr. Marshall, the eminent agricultural 

 writer, says the stomach, when taken from the 

 body of the calf, should be well cleaned of milk, 

 curd, chyle, &c. and the clean bag salted and 

 l)laced ill an earthen jar for three or four days, till 

 a juice or pickle is lOTined; alter which the bag 

 should be taken from the jar, and hung up to dry 

 for two or three days, to let the jjicklc drain off, 

 and then it should be returned to the jar, the 



