Comparison of ripening characteristics of Danbo cheeses from two dairies

Chromatographic and electrophoretic methods have been established as valuable tools in characterising cheese ripening. In a recent IDF-Bulletin. a number of such methods have been described. Some of the methods have been used in the analyses of Danbo 45 + cheese from 41 vats produced in two different dairies. The purpose of this work was to investigate if the two dairies produced cheese with systematic differences in ripening characteristics and thereby possibly also in quality. Casein breakdown was monitored by capillary electrophoresis, peptides by reversed phase liquid chromatography and flavour compounds by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Multivariate analysis of the data was performed by principal component analysis, which revealed systematic differences between the dairies., most clearly in caseins and in peptides. Data from chemical and sensory analyses of a subset of the cheeses showed systematic variations in the chemical variables but only minor differences were found in the sensory attributes. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.