MILK FOR CHEESE MAKING

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 8 May 1935, Page 12

MILK FOR CHEESE MAKING

LOW TESTING PAW PRODUCT. ADVANTAGES OF THE AYRSHIRE. Bottled and ready for the consumer or delivered to the household container placed religiously each morning upon the doorstep, one milk may look like anv other milk, but in a striking manner the Ayrshire Cattle Breeders' Association of New Zealand has endeavoured to show by means of an attractively printed booklet that Ayrshire milk is different from that of other breeds —different in colour, different in food content, different in digestibility and different in the structure and arrangement of the tiny particles of life giving nutrients with which it is charged. Endorsed by the results of scientific research in New Zealand and abroad, and by the opinions from authoritative sources as to the best raw material required for the manufacture of cheese, the information contained in its pages, is arresting. For instance, mention is made of Lord Bledisloe’s statement in addressing the Cawtliron Institute that'“British cheese makers do not approve of the use of very high-testing milk for cheese-making and prime high-priced Cheddars in Great Britain arc not made from it.” The fact that the body of New Zealand cheese is open and rather loose, a matter of some concern to the industry, is noted, as well as the fact that the yield of cheese per pound of butter-fat from high-testing breeds is lower than that from the breeds usually used for the making of cheese. Expert opinion is quoted that milk testing from 31 to 4 per cent, is what is required —a softer curded cheese milk which, in the past and in the hands of competing countries, has produced a type of cheese that matures within reasonable time and possesses true “cheddar” flavour and. close body and texture wlien consumed. When such milk is used there will not bo the present economic waste of •butter fat which occurs when hightesting milk is used for cheese-making or when high-testing milk is made into cheese where it could more profitably be made into butter. These and many other facts are used to'emphasise the advantages of the Ayrshire breed’s production of the “ideal 4 per cent, milk” both for human consumption and manufacturing purposes. An impressive array of unsolicited testimony from medical practitioners, physicians, dictarians and specialists in infant nutrition gives further evidence that soft curd Ayrshire milk is more easily digested and is beneficial to the health of babies, invalids and others. Of particular interest is that section of the booklet devoted to the evidence on cheese payment reform tendered by Mr P. 0. Veale, of Hawera, dairy research chemist, to the 1934 Royal Commission of Agriculture. In this evidence it is shown that hightesting milk gives a decreased cheese return per unit of fat which makes it obvious that a system of payment which pays all suppliers at the same rate per lb. of butter-fat cannot be equitable as between the extremes of high and low testing milk. Attractively set up with a twocolour frontispiece and well illustrated, the booklet, which has been printed by the “Hawera Star” jobbing department, provides a most informative treatise of the Ayrshire breed. It is compiled by Mr R. McCay, secretary to the association whose efforts in that connection are worthy of commendation. The booklet is issued with the compliments of the association free to various institutions for the advancement of public health.