Queso chedar

The drained curds are piled along the sides of the vat with the result that matting of curd particles occurs. To enable faster turnover of the cheese vats it became common practice in the 60d totransfer the curd-whey mixture after cooking to cheaper cheddaring sinks, where whey drainage and cheddaring occurred. The piles of curd are cut into blocks (30x10 cm), which are inverted frequently andpiled over a period of about 2 hr. This operation, known as cheddaring, was considered by many researchers and cheese makers as the most characteristic part of the cheddar cheese manufacturing process.During cheddaring, the curd flows under its own Wight, leading to fusion and deformation of curd particles, which was believed to be responsible for the chicken roast meat structure of fresh cheddarcurd and for the characteristic texture of mature cheddar cheese. Cheddaring promotes a number of physicochemical conditions that are conducive to curd flow and texturization:
* Solubilization ofmicellar calcium, which is bound to the casein and acts as a cementing agent between the casein micelles sub micelles.
* A decrease in the concentration of micellar Ca, resulting in an increase inthe ratio of soluble to case inbound Ca (soluble as a percentage of total Ca in the curd increases from 5% to 40% as the pH decreases from 6.15 to 5.2)
* An increase in paracasein hidratation,which increases with decreasing pH in the range 6.6-5.15.
* An increase in the viscous character of the curd.
The increase in casein hidratation with decreasing pH is probably a consequence of theincrease in the ratio of soluble to micellar Ca. It has been found in model casein systems that casein hydratation is inversely related to the concentration of caseinbound Ca.
As a consequence of thedecrease in casein bound Ca and the increase in casein hidratation the viscoellastic casein matrix, with occluded liquid fat and moisture phases, flows if unrestricted, especially when piled and...