FUNCTIONS OF MILK CONSTITUENTS l8l 



moisture is retained, the cheese is hard, tough and 

 unpalatable. Even in cheese made from normal 

 milk, the body becomes dry and mealy or crumbly, 

 if the amount of moisture falls much below 30 per 

 cent. The higher the fat content of the cheese, the 

 lower can be the amount of water without impair- 

 ing the body of the cheese. The temptation is often 

 strong in making cheese to incorporate 5 per cent 

 or more of moisture beyond the usual amount, be- 

 cause water is the only cheese constituent that can 

 be had free of cost. The aim of cheese-makers 

 should be so to control conditions of manufacture as 

 to retain in cheese only the proper amount of moisture 

 (p. 382). 



We have already stated that another function of 

 water in cheese is to furnish conditions suitable for 

 the work of those agents which convert insoluble 

 cheese proteins into soluble forms. If the amount 

 of water is below a certain limit, 25 to 27 per cent, 

 these changes do not take place and the cheese fails 

 to become edible. 



Some erroneously think that water in cheese is 

 of a peculiar kind and possesses a special value as 

 such, that it is really different from water as we 

 find it elsewhere. One writer goes so far as to 

 speak of the water in cheese as "natural water," 

 "natural moisture," as if it possessed some unusual 

 virtue because it had gone through a cow and 

 formed a part of milk before going into cheese as 

 "natural" water. Such a belief is quite without 

 foundation, because the water in cheese can be 

 easily separated from the cheese and examined and 

 is known to possess the usual composition of water 



