Cheese! It makes pizza worth eating, turns ordinary bread into ooey gooey grilled cheese, is macaroni's best friend, and tastes great with all kinds of other foods. Most people love cheese, whether it's mild and stringy or stinky and strong flavoured. But have you ever wondered how cheese is made?
Cheese has been made since before humans started recording history, in one form or another, but one of the most surprising things is that the basic process hasn't changed much over all that time.
Whatever the type of cheese is, the process is usually the same - with a few extra steps in some cases! So let's learn how cheese is made!
Starter Culture
Starter Culture
Cheese starts with spoiled milk, but unlike milk that goes bad in your home, it's a very carefully controlled procedure.
Fresh milk is taken to a cheese factory, where it is placed in very large containers, and a special type of harmless bacteria known as a "starter" is added to the milk to make it sour, without creating any harmful pathogens.
After the bacteria starter, an enzyme called "rennet" is added to make the milk curdle.
Different types of cheese are made with different starter cultures and rennet combinations.
