How to make blue cheese that doesn't smell

Показать описание

Forget roquefort - new blue cheeses are coming soon to a cheese aisle near you! The fungi that give blue cheeses their unique taste normally reproduce asexually - so it's hard to make changes to their genes and therefore the character of the cheese. But scientists have discovered a way to cross different strains together to make new kinds of blue cheese.

Myconeos is a start-up fungal food company linked to the University of Nottingham. Research at the University over the past decade has been investigating the fungus Penicillium roqueforti, which is used in the production of blue cheeses such as Stilton, Roquefort and Gorgonzola. It is the presence of the fungi growing in the cheese that gives blue cheeses their blue-veined appearance and unique taste due to production of flavour compounds by the fungus. Traditionally only a limited number of strains of the fungus have been used for cheese production as we have lacked ways to produce new strains.

Now with funding from BBSRC, researchers have made a major breakthrough by finding a way to sexually reproduce the fungus in the laboratory. This has meant that they have been able to cross different Stilton, Roquefort and Gorgonzola strains together and then collect the sexual offspring.

As with traditional animal and plant breeding they were then able to select offspring that had desirable, novel characteristics such as mild or intense flavours but without the pungency (smelly socks and ammonia!) often associated with blue cheeses.

Researchers collected over 120 new sexual strains and, after safety tests, tried making cheese with some of them, first in small-scale laboratory trials and then with some English and Scottish cheesemakers. They were delighted to find that in blind taste trials including the traditional Stilton, Roquefort and Gorgonzola strains, the top four cheeses selected by the public were made with four of these novel strains. This is the first time that sexual breeding has ever been used for the blue cheese fungus, and is a traditional rather than GM method.

The company Myconeos has now started production and sales of these strains and they will be available for both large-scale and artisan cheese makers to use.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SUBSCRIBE ⏩ Want to get more like this? Subscribe to our YouTube channel.

CONNECT WITH US 📲
Keep in touch via our social channels!

___________________________________________

DISCOVER THE COUNCILS
Through the UK’s nine leading academic and industrial funding councils, we create #KnowledgeWithImpact.
Discover the councils' YouTube channels below:

____________________________________________

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) works in partnership with universities, research organisations, businesses, charities and government to create the best possible environment for research and innovation to flourish. Operating across the whole of the UK with a combined budget of more than £7 billion, UKRI brings together the seven Research Councils, Innovate UK and Research England.

#research #UKRI #simplescience