Abstract

The zesty lemon cheese was made by using lemon juice to curdle the milk by removing water from milk.
The lemon juice was used as the substitute of citric acid which is based on the process of cheese making,
The principles of making cheese were viewed and the effect of different solutions pH had on the
process of cheese making in general which included the preventing unwanted cost of using bacterial,
citric acids for promotion of moisture to curdle the milk, texture, flavor as the lemon juice and ultra-
pasteurized in the milk etc.

Introduction

Cheese is a simply spontaneous processes reaction which, thousands of years ago, led to this common
dairy product. It is made by removing water from the milk is the process of making cheese, which this
water is called whey. This process was discovered accidently by using the sheeps stomach to transport
milk, the heat from the sun and the rennet in the stomach separated the thin milky whey and lumpy
curd which was called cheese. The rennet (chymosin) is a proteolytic enzyme and its role in cheese
making is to destabilize casein micelles and make them to coagulate. The milk from various animals,
buffaloes, goats, particularly cattle and sheep is used to make cheese1. The large animal often produce
larger amount of milk therefore the cow milk or buffaloes are often used. The rennet which is used to
coagulate milk has its sets back since it requires the enzymes from the animal stomach which means the
killing of many animals to obtain it therefore shortage of animal-based enzymes and various kinds of
aversion of some people to such sources, have led to the use of proteases isolated from plants and
microorganisms to make cheeses, some of which are called vegetarian cheeses6. The shortage of this
animal-based enzymes has led to people looking for alternative use in order to make the milk curdle. To
curdle milk has many methods like the use of use heat and acid (lemon juice, vinegar, tartaric, citric).
Curdled milk is often a sign of spoilage. Bacteria that are naturally present in the milk eat lactose and
create lactic acid in the process. Acids cause the fats and liquids in the milk to separate, which is why it
curdles6.

The mixture is also pasteurized, homogenized, and incubated with a lactic bacterial culture at 30C. Then
the solidified mixture is homogenized again and packed without cooling. Products which have not been
made by the traditional procedure may not be called 'cream cheese' and terms such as 'cream cheese
food' or 'cream cheese spread' are used1,6. They are three types of cheese which are produced and this
is because of the curdled milk methods which are different therefore different type of cheese with
different flavours are produced due to these methods. They are soft, semi-soft, semi-hard and hard
cheese depending on the method used. This is also an affecting factor in how long it will last and the
condition under which it can be preserved or stored in order to have a long shelf life.

In this experiment the zesty lemon cheese is dealt with to find out the best curdled milk in all the
methods of cheese and since lemon are abounded meaning no shortage of the source to curdle the milk
and the look of how helpful or the benefits in health of using the lemon to coagulate the milk. Lemon
juice speed up the coagulation of the milk and also the use of heat rather than the use of cultural
bacterial to coagulate milk. Lemon juice is used as a citric acid substitute to curdle the milk. Lemon juice
is also used as the flavour of cheese.

Results

Table 4: pH of the solution and their impact on the process of cheese making3.

Solution Average The effect of pH on the process of cheese making:

pH

HCl 0.83 By adding pH of 0.927 HCl to the brine bath the pH is lowered
(pH below 5) and so preventing unwanted growth of bacteria.

NaOH 12.26 Promote high moisture making the cheese good and soft i.e.
high-quality Cheddar cheese.

Lemon juice 1.61 Acidic substance such as lemon juice causes the milk proteins
(casein) to tangle into solid masses, or curds.

Tartaric acid 1.39 Provide or enhance the characteristic flavours and textures of
cheese.

Vinegar 1.94 Acidic substance such as vinegar causes the milk proteins
(casein) to tangle into solid masses, or curds.

Aceitic acid -0.18 Adding acid at the start (cheesemakers call this pre-
acidification), you're basically removing calcium. This has effects
on texture forming cheese like mozzarella cheese.

Milk 6.46 Promotes negative charges in the structure of cheese is a protein

called casein.

Discussion

The experiment was successful since the zesty lemon cheese was produced and it also had a delicious
taste with the flavor of lemon in it. The milk was curdled by adding lemon juice which was the
substitute for the citric acid . This is also great since there is no shortage of lemon therefore lemon juice
help in the increased production of lemon cheese which has wonderful benefits in health and also that
lemon are natural therefore has no negative effect on the environment rather than bacterial culture
which are bad and have no added flavour in the production of cheese therefore the addition of flavours
are needed in the production which will also mean an increase in cost production if bacterial culture are
used as the bacterial culture are also expensive. These bacteria convert the lactose (milk sugar) to lactic
acid and lower the milks pH3,6. This lowering of the milk pH which is 6.46 was achieved by adding the
lemon juice with the pH of 1.61. This proved to be successful since most of the cheese pH range from 5.1
to 5.9 in pH. However, this range will have exceptions to certain types of cheeses such as Camembert
cheese which has a pH of 7.43,6. Our cheese had the pH of 4.85 which is close to the range therefore this
shows that the experiment was successful.

Tartaric acid (pH 1.39): Tartaric acid is a solidifying agent, taste enhancing and is a material for
maintenance of humidity and a pH regulator. This acid react with other antioxidant substances to avoid
rancidity and discoloration in cheeses1,3.

HCl (pH 0.83): HCL is added to the brine bath in which the cheeses float during a certain period of time.
During this period, proteins together with water leak out of the cheese. As a result of an increase of
protein concentration in the brine bath the pH increases. For food safety reasons the growth of
microorganisms must be prohibited or limited. By adding HCl to the brine bath the pH is lowered (pH
below 5) and so preventing unwanted growth of bacteria. A brine bath is used to process hard-rind
cheese. HCl is not added to the curdled milk or curds and is therefore a processing aid3.

Aceitic acid (pH 0.81): Aceitic acid is a "chelating agent", which means it loves to scoop up calcium atoms
from the cheese. So adding too much can have a double whammy effect (acid + chelating) which can
effect texture.

Enzyme (rennet) coagulation: the coagulation of milk by the action of rennet occurs in two stages
(phases)3.

Milk (pH 6.553): The structure of cheese is a protein called casein. Casein proteins are floating around in
milk in little agglomerates called micelles. These micelles are made up of various different types of
casein (alpha, beta, kappa, etc.). The outside of these micelles are little hair-like proteins (those are the
kappa caseins). These hair-like structures are all negatively charged at milk pH (6-7). Like charges repel,
so all of these casein micelles are covered in negative charges and they basically bounce off each other
in milk 3,4.

Primary phase: Also called the enzymatic phase. The enzyme attacks the stabilizing components of the
micelles. A piece of the casein which has a strong negative charge is cut off and hydrophobic (water
rejecting) bonds between the casein micelles can be established. The enzymatic phase is in particular
influenced by temperature, pH and amount of enzyme. The optimum temperature for rennet enzyme is
40 42oC but usually a temperature of around 30-32oC is used 3,6.

Secondary phase: Also called the coagulation phase. The aggregation of changed casein micelles (para-
casein) takes place. The presence of Ca++ and to some extend Mg++ plays an important role in this
reaction. The positive calcium and magnesium ions (cations) helps in neutralizing the negative charges
on the casein. For this reason additional calcium is sometimes added to cheese milk, to increase velocity
of coagulation and to get a firmer coagulum. It is usually added in the form of calcium chloride (CaCl2)
3,6
.
Lemon juice (pH 1.61) and vinegar (pH 1.94): Curds are a dairy product obtained by coagulating milk in a
process called curdling. The coagulation can be caused by adding rennet or any edible acidic substance
such as lemon juice or vinegar, and then allowing it to sit. The increased acidity causes the milk proteins
(casein) to tangle into solid masses, or curds. Milk that has been left to sour (raw milk alone or
pasteurized milk with added lactic acid bacteria) will also naturally produce curds, and sour milk cheeses
are produced this way 3,6.

Conclusion

The experiment was successful as seen in the table 1 above the lemon juice and vinegar are the best
method of coagulating the milk. The lemon also has added benefits in health with the dairy benefits that
comes with milk. The pH of the milk is 6.46 and therefore adding lemon juice turned the milk into maas
which is prefect form of making cheese as the pH of maas is 4.290 therefore the lemon decreases the pH
of milk to maas by 1.61 giving the pH of 4.85. Sour flavours in cheese come from the acidity in the lemon
juice as it was used to curdle the milk this was also present in the cheese during the tasting of the
cheese product which was obtained at the end of the experiment . The lemon juice is much faster than
the use of bacterial culture to curdle the milk. The addition of calcium chloride was not needed as the
lemon juice was used therefore lemon cheese is the best when compared with other methods in cheese
making as it also has health benefit not to mention cheese alone as it has all the dairy product benefits
and the added lemon juice alone has its own benefit in health. The rennet which is obtained in animal
stomach is not needed when using lemon juice there it also has benefits since animals must be killed to
obtain such rennet or the cost of manufacturing such enzyme.

References

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Milchwissenschaft 40(4):193-196 (1985) (Milk gel structure. XV. Electron microscopy of whey
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2. Kosikowski, F.V., Mistry, V.V. Cheese and Fermented Milk Foods. Vol. 1. 3rd edition. Westport,
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3. Kosikowski, F.V., and Mistry, V.V. 1999. Bakers', Neufchatel, cream, quark, and ymer, in Cheese
and fermented milk foods: Volume II, procedures and analysis. F.V. Kosikowski, L.L.C., Virginia,
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4. Modler, H.W., Poste, L.M., and Butler, G. 1985. Sensory evaluation of an all-dairy formulated
creamtype produced by a new method. J. Dairy Sci., 68(11): 2835-2839.

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6. Meghwal, M. Goyal, M. R. and Chavan, R.S (2017) Dairy Engineering: Advanced Technologies
and Their Applications Canada: Apple Academic Press