(1/2) #Cheese🧀 science!
“All #cheeses are preserved #milk, but they can be squishy & almost liquid, brittle & crumbly or nearly rock-hard. Yet if you zoom in, their #molecules have the same basic structure.
Making cheese 🧀 is about creating a #spongelike structure out of the #milkprotein called #casein, essentially a mesh held together by #calcium. The sponge’s gaps are filled with #fatglobules & 💧 water.”
(2/2…no…3) The key to the #cheese’s 🧀 outward appearance is the #protein mesh, & the rest is window-dressing.
To make cheese, the #milkproteins are coagulated to form #curds, & these curds are chopped up & pressed to remove 💦 water.
Most #cheeses are aged for 2-24 months, & their structure changes as some of the proteins break down over time. The outcome can vary hugely depending on the number & strength of the bonds holding the #casein mesh together.”
HelenCzerski, #WSJ, #EverydayPhysics
(3/3…no…4) “#Cheese with more #water 💧 or more #fat is generally softer, because those fillers space out the #protein matrix, reducing the number of #interconnections.
More mature cheese 🧀 is crumblier because its #proteinmatrix has broken down further.
A #cheddar can be somewhere in the middle, not too hard or too soft.
Varying the #proteinstructure can create almost any #texture.”
HelenCzerski, #WSJ, #EverydayPhysics
(4/4…no…5) “…the way a #cheese’s #proteinmesh responds to force is unique. It responds like a solid if cut or squeezed quickly but more like a flowing liquid if the mesh has more time to respond by releasing the stress.
…as you press down to slice through it, a cheese 🧀 becomes progressively stiffer & stronger. This is because the #casein mesh is squashed out around the cut, like a stretched sponge; it becomes stronger because it can’t easily move any further.”
(5/5) “The advantage of a (#cheese)wire is that you can apply pressure only at the edge of the cut without all the extra friction & without squashing the cheese 🧀 so much that it becomes stiffer & harder to cut.
…Cutting cheese with a wire is a neat solution to the #physics problem of how to create a sharp, smooth cut in a resistant #proteinmesh.”
#HelenCzerski, #WSJ, #EverydayPhysics #CheeseScience #CheeseWire #CheeseCutter #Cheesy
😛
Renee