22 Composition of Cheese. 



a large quantity of milk. The most scrupulous cleanliness 

 therefore is brought into constant play by a good dairywoman, 

 who never minds any amount of trouble in scalding and scrub- 

 bing her vessels, and takes pride, as soon as possible after her 

 cheeses are safely lodged in the presses, in having the dairy look 

 as clean and tidy as the most fastidious can wish. It is a plea- 

 sure to see one of these hardworking women at work, especially 

 as such a sight is not often witnessed, slovenly dairymaids being 

 unfortunately in a majority. This being the case, we should 

 encourage the use of tin pails and tin or brass cheese-tubs. 

 Wooden pails, &c., are very good in the hands of a tidy dairy- 

 maid, but not otherwise. There is much less labour in thoroughly 

 cleaning a tin or brass vessel than a wooden one, and boiling-hot 

 water is not then required. Wood being a porous material 

 inevitably absorbs more or less of the milk ; tin or brass does not. 

 The milk thus absorbed cannot be removed by simple washing. 

 Inasmuch as all ferments are destroyed by water at the tempera- 

 ture of 212, it is important to ascertain that the water is per- 

 fectly boiling ; and yet it is strange that few women compara- 

 tively speaking, though they may have spent many years in the 

 kitchen, know to a certainty when the kettle is really boiling. 

 This remark applies to some educated as well as uneducated 

 females. They often mistake the singing noise of the' tea-kettle 

 accompanied by a certain amount of vapour for a sign that water 

 is in a state of ebullition ; so that if you would drink good tea 

 you must be careful to whom you trust to make it. 



In some dairies of Cheshire it is customary to paint the wooden 

 cheese-tubs in the interior. I confess I do not like this at all ; lead- 

 paint is not a very desirable thing to be used in connection with 

 cheese ; and I am glad to find that the best dairy-farmers are 

 decidedly adverse to this proceeding. 



Milk sometimes gets tainted by the close proximity of pigstyes 

 or waterclosets, or by underground drains. Not very long ago I 

 visited a dairy in Wiltshire, where every possible care was taken by 

 the dairymaid to produce good cheese ; but I noticed a peculiarly 

 disagreeable smell in the dairy, and on making inquiries I found 

 that there was a cesspool close at hand, which certainly tainted 

 the milk, and rendered the making of good cheese an impossi- 

 bility. In the third place, I would notice that if dairies are not 

 well situated, if they have, for instance, a south aspect, so that a 

 proper low temperature in summer cannot be maintained, the 

 milk is apt to turn sour and to make sour cheese. It is im- 

 portant, therefore, that dairies should be built with a northern 

 aspect. 



These are some of the circumstances that spoil the cheese even 



