PRELIMINARY AND MINOR PAPERS. 
COMPOSITION OF ROQUEFORT-CHEESE FAT 
By Jamejs N. Currie, 
Chemist , Dairy Division , Bureau of Animal Industry 
INTRODUCTION 
Many of the problems encountered in attempts to produce a cheese of 
the Roquefort type in this country can be attributed to differences in 
composition between sheep's milk and cow's milk. These differ not only in 
the absolute and relative amounts of fat, casein, milk sugar, and ash, but 
also in the composition of some of these individual constituents. In a 
recent publication the author (1914, p. 7) 1 attributed the peppery taste 
of Roquefort cheese to the accumulation during the ripening process of 
certain volatile fatty acids of the group insoluble or but partially soluble 
in water. In view of this it seemed desirable to make a comparative 
study of the fat of cow's milk and the fat of typical imported Roquefort 
cheese, with special regard to this group of acids. 
Roquefort cheese is made chiefly from sheep's milk. The milk supply 
of the Roquefort-cheese industry is rigidly inspected by agents of the 
controlling companies for the express purpose of prohibiting the adul¬ 
teration of sheep's milk. However, the addition of small amounts of 
cow's milk and also of goat’s milk is admitted by the cheese makers. 
Marre (1906, p. 53) gives the following statistics concerning the milk used 
in the manufacture of Roquefort cheese for 1904: 
Table) I. —Statistics of the manufacture of Roquefort cheese in IQ04 
Kind of animal. 
Number of 
animals. 
Milk produced. 
Proportion of 
milk. 
Kwes. 
521,330 
1.569 
699 
Hectoliters. 
329, 420 
8 ,337 
605 
Per cent. 
97-36 
2. 46 
.18 
Cows. 
Goats. 
For the purpose of this investigation it was thought that a study of the 
undecomposed fat of typical imported Roquefort cheese would be fully 
as significant as a study of the fat of sheep's milk, although it is recog¬ 
nized that the two may not be strictly identical. 
1 Bibliographic citations in parentheses refer to "Literature cited," p. 421. 
Journal of Agricultural Research, 
Dept, of Agriculture, Washington, D. C. 
(429) 
Vol. II, No. 6 
Sept, ai, 19x4 
A—9 
