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GENERAL CHEESE MAKING BOARDS (Specific Cheese Making in Boards above) => INGREDIENTS - Ripening Aroma & Flavour Cultures & Enzymes => Topic started by: silverjam on May 07, 2012, 01:34:19 PM

Title: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: silverjam on May 07, 2012, 01:34:19 PM
In researching B Linens and its properties I came across the suggestion that the bacteria is also what produces body odour and foot odour. Ok that doesn't really bother me that there is a connection, but my thought is this... Does working with B Linens particularly in the constant washing and handling of smear ripened cheeses lead to a cross contamination of bacteria from cheese to the human? It seems inevitable that the B Linens will make its way into/under the skin of cheese makers. Simply put, can B Linens contaminate the skin of a human in the process of ongoing development of smear ripened cheeses? Those that make the cheeses will know that there is very much a hands on interaction between the cheese and hands - particularly if you are using an atomiser/spray with B Linens water to wash the cheese.

Sorry for the grammar. I think American English is Odor possibly? Also I am sure I get the vote for the weirdest question of the month.

Anyone have any thoughts?
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Boofer on May 07, 2012, 01:54:22 PM
Funny you should mention that. My wife remembers a neighbor gentleman from her childhood. He used to work at a cheeserie and would come home after work smelling strongly of cheese and whatever other odors clung to him from the cheese workplace. I don't think her recollection of him is particularly favorable (is that favourable to you?).

-Boofer-
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: linuxboy on May 07, 2012, 06:37:15 PM
Quote
Simply put, can B Linens contaminate the skin of a human in the process of ongoing development of smear ripened cheeses?
Of course.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Tomer1 on May 07, 2012, 11:54:08 PM
Its most likely that you were already contaminated, even before you started washing wheels and all that dangerous stuff :)
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: smilingcalico on May 08, 2012, 07:26:32 AM
On days I had to be in the ageing cave for only a couple hours, it's no big deal. But the day I had to be in there for 10 hours! Phew! I couldn't stand to smell myself! A good old shower does the trick though.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Tomer1 on May 08, 2012, 10:10:13 AM
Well, Unpowered gloves are always a good choice in terms of sanitation.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: tinysar on May 08, 2012, 12:12:18 PM
There are all sorts of critters living on your skin all the time: B. linens, Propionibacteria, and Lactobacillus are all common body flora. Apparently B. linens eats dead skin, hence the claim that washed-rind cheeses smell like "stinky feet" - feet are a great environment for these bacteria. I think the hands would be less ideal, especially if they were washed (and scrubbed to remove the dead skin - like around the nails) regularly. You have to remember that our skin is not a "clean" growing medium like fresh curds - the skin already has populations of bacteria filling that niche. Avoiding nasty body odours is just as much about maintaining neutral or sweet-smelling bacteria, as about avoiding the nasty-smelling ones.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: NimbinValley on May 08, 2012, 12:29:23 PM
We should also remember that bathing, in western europe anyway, is a relatively new idea so it is highly likely that cheese and 'unclean' people have been coexisting for centuries.  It is also highly likely that a lack of refrigeration also meant that symbiotic relationships have existed between humans and their food for centuries as well.  Not very pleasant when you get down to the tin tacks of it all, but there you go...
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Boofer on May 08, 2012, 01:26:40 PM
There are all sorts of critters living on your skin all the time: B. linens, Propionibacteria, and Lactobacillus are all common body flora. Apparently B. linens eats dead skin, hence the claim that washed-rind cheeses smell like "stinky feet" - feet are a great environment for these bacteria. I think the hands would be less ideal, especially if they were washed (and scrubbed to remove the dead skin - like around the nails) regularly. You have to remember that our skin is not a "clean" growing medium like fresh curds - the skin already has populations of bacteria filling that niche. Avoiding nasty body odours is just as much about maintaining neutral or sweet-smelling bacteria, as about avoiding the nasty-smelling ones.
Well, this has certainly been a delightful discussion....  :o

The reason I wear gloves when handling my cheeses. One less variable in the process.

-Boofer-
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Tomer1 on May 08, 2012, 03:53:57 PM
You you use disposable PE or latex gloves or reusable PVC gloves? ("chemical handling")
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: smilingcalico on May 08, 2012, 08:58:15 PM
I used to work a cheese counter and EVEN THOUGH I WORE GLOVES, cutting the Domestic German Brick, I still had the stink on my hands for 2 DAYS!!!  Sometimes you can't win for losing, as the expression goes.  I still can't quite figure out that expression, just know I'm using it properly, LOL.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Boofer on May 08, 2012, 11:43:44 PM
You you use disposable PE or latex gloves or reusable PVC gloves? ("chemical handling")
I use disposable Blue Nitrile (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000OFMIYM/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i00) gloves. I wash my hands enough already.

Here's a comment from another satisfied user:
"I originally began buying these gloves for work in a cadaver lab as the formaldehyde smell does not come through. The gloves are easy to put on and they easily last 3 hours of lab work, even with blunt dissection using fingers. I've since begun purchasing these for diaper changes for our church nursery and will probably use them for pretty much any task where I'll need a glove. But the bottom line is that these gloves are less expensive and higher quality than what I've found in elsewhere."

-Boofer-
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: NimbinValley on May 09, 2012, 12:33:46 AM
Yes, quite.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Caseus on May 09, 2012, 02:59:56 AM
I like those gloves too, Boofer.  I use them in my darkroom to protect my hands from photochemicals.  I'm not using them for cheesemaking though.  I just wash my hands thoroughly before touching the cheese. 

On my very first cheese make, I didn't even have a ladle for strring.  I just stirred with my hand and arm stuck in halfway up to my elbow, per David B. Fankhauser, Ph.D., in step 11 of CHEESE MAKING ILLUSTRATED (http://biology.clc.uc.edu/Fankhauser/Cheese/Cheese_5_gallons/CHEESE_5gal_00.htm).

I was watching a show on TV a couple of day's ago, I think it was something like "Chuck's Week Off - Mexico".  The host, Chuck Hughes, traveled to Baja (Lotero) where he visited a couple of remote ranches and learned how to make sun-dried (and fly-covered) beef jerky at one, and ranchero cheese at another.  If you can find a replay of that show, I highly recommend it.  It is worth it just to see how the tough looking Mexican woman rancher milks her cow and immediately makes a simple ranchero cheese with the milk.  She does it outdoors on her front porch, in not especially fastidious manner, unwashed hands mixing right into the curds, with files crawling around on the table nearby.  I think this is closer to the way cheese is made by simple folk the world over for their own consumption and sustenance.  Still, I'm not persuaded to dispense with all sanitation.  I am at least inclined to wash my hands before plunging them into the curd to stir during cooking.   :P
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Tomer1 on May 09, 2012, 08:19:08 AM
Perhaps repeated exposure to Ecoli makes you more resistant.
In that part of world where water quality is not very high , runny bottom is just a part of life :)
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Boofer on May 09, 2012, 02:29:12 PM
I've got to find that herbal remedy the healer gave me for my persistent bot fly (http://www.vexman.com/botfly.htm) infestation. Boy, my head itches.  :P

-Boofer-
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: tinysar on May 10, 2012, 02:39:16 AM
I used to work a cheese counter and EVEN THOUGH I WORE GLOVES, cutting the Domestic German Brick, I still had the stink on my hands for 2 DAYS!!!

I wonder if the persistent smell might be caused by ammonia, rather than any kind of bacterial infestation? Gloves wouldn't stop a gas.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: smilingcalico on May 10, 2012, 05:33:12 AM
I'm not sure, the smell was definitely more than ammonia, but I can see where that's a contender.  In the end, does it matter, my hands stank like $#!+ and that's what counted.  I'll let you know though, as I'll be doing washed rind cheeses often with my new employer.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Tomer1 on May 10, 2012, 10:33:12 AM
Quote
B Linens is the same bacteria strain
allow me to correct.
Its the same genus (species), not strain. there are as many strains as people I would imagine. :)
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Boofer on May 12, 2012, 03:16:22 AM
Sorry I haven't worked out how to specifically quote a section of a post...
Click on the QUOTE at the top right of whatever post you'd like to quote. You'll see <open bracket>"quote author=" with the author's name, the topic number and the <close bracket>. At the very end of the quoted passage you'll see "/quote" surrounded by brackets, indicating the close point of the passage you just quoted. As long as you don't touch the bracketed open quote or closing quote, you can delete anything in that quote. To check on your work, go to the bottom of your posting and click on Preview.

Hope that helps.

-Boofer-
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: hoeklijn on July 16, 2012, 06:50:52 PM
We should also remember that bathing, in western europe anyway, is a relatively new idea

Well, we are lucky to learn fast   ^-^ By the way, my avatar is a picture of the townhall of Gouda, finished in 1459, a 147 years before Dutch explorers discovered Australia  >:D

B Linens is the same bacteria strain that causes body odour, in particular on the feet.

mmm, any idea to how make a slurry with this information?

I somewhere read that in some French districts it is forbidden to have Epoisses with you in public transport. Anybody knowing if this is true? 
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: NimbinValley on July 17, 2012, 12:54:03 AM
We should also remember that bathing, in western europe anyway, is a relatively new idea

Well, we are lucky to learn fast   ^-^ By the way, my avatar is a picture of the townhall of Gouda, finished in 1459, a 147 years before Dutch explorers discovered Australia  >:D


...and if I remember my high school history correctly they said it was the most miserable place on earth with no potential so they left a plaque made of pewter with their details on it  (not sure who they thought would read it?) and promptly left...and the rest is history!
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: hoeklijn on July 17, 2012, 04:38:20 AM
LOL, yes, and we also didn't do a very good deal in trading New Amsterdam (New York) for Surinam...
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: NimbinValley on July 17, 2012, 05:35:19 AM
well the climate is much better in Surinam...its all in how you look at it.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Banjoza on July 17, 2012, 06:55:13 AM
Disgusting thought but I sort of have a vision of "ancient" man - or woman lugging a wheel of cheese to the market under her armpit and the buyer only getting round to eating it some months later and finding it especially delicious....
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: NimbinValley on July 18, 2012, 12:54:44 AM
It all depends on how you look at it... most of the beasties that live in and around us are harmless.  And given their co-evolution with us it is no surprise that people find their flavours etc and other effects on food to be pleasurable.  What I find disturbing is that if things such as e-coli had been on the whole beneficial to us in some ways then we may today be cultivating faecal type flavours in our food instead of diacetyl etc.  Food for thought?  I'll stick to diacetyl thanks...
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Sailor Con Queso on July 18, 2012, 02:12:40 PM
I guess you might call a fecal (E. coli) cheese a HaFARTY. ;)
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Dulcelife on July 18, 2012, 04:03:24 PM
Disgusting thought but I sort of have a vision of "ancient" man - or woman lugging a wheel of cheese to the market under her armpit and the buyer only getting round to eating it some months later and finding it especially delicious....

Don't forget the fine red wine made from the sweaty, yeasty-foot-mashed mash that buyer bought to go along with the cheese.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Banjoza on July 18, 2012, 05:59:32 PM
Ugh!  I think I just became a beer and pickles eater. That highbrow cheese and wine stuff is just not all it's cracked up to be!
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: george on July 19, 2012, 10:07:59 AM
I guess you might call a fecal (E. coli) cheese a HaFARTY. ;)

Oh boy, Sailor, that one was so bad I went and scared the cat laughing again.   ;D   Thanks for my morning guffaw.
Title: Re: B Linens and Body Odour
Post by: Boofer on July 19, 2012, 01:51:08 PM
That is destined to become a classic, Sailor.  ::)

Yep, definitely time to make a really stinky cheese.
Honey, does this smell?

-Boofer-