How Do Holes Get into Cheese?
Why are there so many holes in Emmentaler and Maaslander, while Gouda cheese has far fewer? And what do the shape and size of those holes say about the quality and flavour? We looked into it for you.
Cheese is made from milk, as you probably already knew. Rennet is added to the milk to make it coagulate. To prevent spoilage and give the cheese a fresh flavour, lactic acid bacteria are added—specifically, propionic acid bacteria.
Little Farts
They produce a little carbon dioxide (or, as Willem Wever puts it, the bacteria let off little farts in the cheese), which creates gas bubbles in the cheese. The more starter culture, the more holes. Emmentaler, Maasdammer, Leerdammer and Tynjetaler contain plenty of starter culture and therefore have lots of holes; Gouda cheese contains less starter culture and is therefore less airy.
The propionic acid also gives the cheese a slightly sharp, sweet flavour. This means that cheeses with larger holes are also more tangy than those with small holes. Small, round holes, incidentally, aren’t called holes but eyes.
Shiny Eyes
Can you tell anything else from those eyes and holes? You certainly can. Round, shiny eyes predict a fresh, clean cheese flavour. If they aren’t round but oval—also known as ‘slit eyes’—this often means that young and young matured cheese has a slightly sour or bitter taste. In mature and extra-mature cheese, oval eyes are perfectly normal.
Off-Flavour
Does the cheese have lots of tiny holes, like a sponge, or are they slightly dull? That’s usually a bad sign. It may mean that some dirt has ended up in the cheese—for example, if a cow kicks off the milking machine during milking and the device sucks up some dirt—which can give it a strange off-flavour. There’s nothing else wrong with the cheese, so it’s usually sold at a slightly lower price.
Read also:
- What on earth is in a kaassoufflé?
- Dream job: which mega-lucky person will make money tasting cheese??
- You’ve been grating your cheese wrong your entire life
