"Brískola" cheese, a (slight) success?

[MauroTrev]

This is my third attempt at making this cheese (it is called /'bris.ko.la/, like the card game), and I think I nailed it. I hope.
This is a soft cheese typical of my area.
These photos are from the fourteenth day of maturation. Some mold is noticeable, and I think the hole in the third photo is an error. Something was fermenting inside? Is it safe to eat?





The procedure was as follows.
- 961 g of milk bought 30-45 minutes before (15 minute journey in a thermal bag and then kept in the fridge)
- pasteurized at 72 °C for 20 s
- then brought to 40 °C
- added 14 g of skyr with expiry at 7 days, left to activate for 5 minutes
- inoculum of 0.31 g of 75% w/w chymosin rennet (that is 30 ml/100 l)
- maintained at 40 °C
- after 110 minutes it coagulated
- then first cut in columns of 4 cm
- waited for 20 minutes
- second cherry cut
- mix for 2 minutes
- wait for 10 minutes
- transferred to the baskets with turnings every 30 minutes, for 90 minutes. Weight 213 g.

Then 18% brine the following day at a temperature of 10.5 °C for 2 hours.

Maturation at 14.6°C and 62% (this value to be taken with a grain of salt).

Every day I dried, removed the whey, weighed, and turned the cheese upside down.
The weight curve is following the formula 0.84 - 0.06 * ln(days) in percent of initial weight.

[MauroTrev]

Well, it turned out that I made a (big) mistake: I used salt with iodine instead of the one without iodine...
Anyway it turned out good.

[mikekchar]

I always wanted to try that.  What happens?  Everyone always says it's "bad", but nobody ever says what "bad" means 

[MauroTrev]

I read that "iodine can thwart the activity of the starter bacteria and prevent them from doing their job" and that "the usual iodized salt is not suitable for making cheese, because iodine inhibits the growth of starter bacteria and delays the maturing process" and that "iodized salt can also slow the aging process drastically", and that "the iodine component of iodized salt inhibits and can actually kill all the bacterial and mould cultures that you actually want in your cheese".

[mikekchar]

I've read that too, but I don't actually believe it    There are a lot of things that are stated without actually trying it (I'm as guilty as anyone...)  Most of the aging in cheese is enzymatic.  Iodine will do *nothing* with that.  While cultures *do* survive, in cheese, I don't believe they play a large role in flavor or texture development (I could be wrong, though).  It's possible they keep the pH constant, so maybe cheeses without active cultures may be softer.  As for rind growths, even if you inhibited that growth, you'll still have good cheese.  So the idea that iodine in salt damages cheese seems like it's a well meaning, but incorrect extrapolation from pickle making (where it *is* important).  But I've never tried it.  I don't even know where to buy iodized salt here... :-)  I live in Japan and people eat a lot of seaweed, so iodizing salt is not that popular.

[Aris]

I've read that too, but I don't actually believe it    There are a lot of things that are stated without actually trying it (I'm as guilty as anyone...)  Most of the aging in cheese is enzymatic.  Iodine will do *nothing* with that.  While cultures *do* survive, in cheese, I don't believe they play a large role in flavor or texture development (I could be wrong, though).  It's possible they keep the pH constant, so maybe cheeses without active cultures may be softer.  As for rind growths, even if you inhibited that growth, you'll still have good cheese.  So the idea that iodine in salt damages cheese seems like it's a well meaning, but incorrect extrapolation from pickle making (where it *is* important).  But I've never tried it.  I don't even know where to buy iodized salt here... :-)  I live in Japan and people eat a lot of seaweed, so iodizing salt is not that popular.

From what I understand microbes/cultures do play a large role because of their enzymes and the flavor compounds they produce during fermentation (diacetyl, lactic acid, esters and etc.). They also release enzymes when they die iirc. Cultures also play a significant role in texture, Yoav Perry/iratherfly mentioned this to me before. Center for Dairy Research Dairy Pipeline also mentioned different cultures will also influence the final moisture of the cheese and moisture content is related to texture. Rennet enzymes of course also play a role in aging.

I have a 10 strain meso thermo yogurt and it contains L. rhamnosus. I researched it and this is what I found "Lactobacillus rhamnosus is a non-starter lactic acid bacterium that plays a significant role during cheese ripening, leading to the formation of flavor. In long-ripened cheeses it persists throughout the whole time of ripening due to its capacity to adapt to changing environmental conditions"
https://bmcmicrobiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2180-14-28#:~:text=Lactobacillus%20rhamnosus%20is%20a%20non,adapt%20to%20changing%20environmental%20conditions.

I believe L. Helveticus is like L. rhamnosus which also persist during cheese aging and plays a large role in the flavor development of Alpine cheeses and famous grana cheeses. It also aids in the formation of tyrosine crystals (texture).

[mikekchar]

Just to be clear (because I'm not sure I was), the enzymes are neither alive nor dead.  They are just chemicals.  As far as I know they aren't affected by iodine.

Also, the enzymes from the cultures are from the cell walls of the culture.  They only affect the cheese *after the cells of the culture break down*. So any enzymes that are breaking down protein and fat *from the cultures* are from dead cells.  So I don't think iodine will affect that hugely.  There may be less (because there are less cells), but I'd be surprised if there aren't enough.  It's also possible that I'm wrong (always possible!) and that the enzymes are produced by *live* cultures, but that's not my current understanding.

Enzymes that are introduced from mold growing on the rind won't be present, but that's also true of cheeses that are waxed or vacuum packed.  It changes the character of the cheese, but it's still good cheese.

I've never heard of anyone actually trying to age a cheese that was salted with iodized salt, so I've never gotten any reliable evidence one way or the other.

Edit: Aha.  Aris, the paper that you linked to references this one: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0740002013000373?via%3Dihub  In it they discuss that current thinking is that enzymatic activity is responsible for ripening flavours, but they hypothesize that *some* flavour is bacterial in nature.  I haven't had a chance to read it thoroughly, though.  So probably we're at one of those "science doesn't quite know".  Another paper referenced discusses the problems with the way they have been studying cheese ripening: they start by pateurising and homogenizing the cheese.  So they don't actually know how the amino acids and peptides get there.  They are kind of working backwards.

So it's still quite interesting.  I'm more eager than ever to try aging a cheese using iodized salt.

[Aris]

I know about enzymes pretty well. I used to make Koji rice (for miso, amazake, makgeolli, shochu and shio koji) a lot using wild grown Aspergillus Oryzae. For example when making shio koji or miso, the high salt content and the moisture will kill the Koji mold but the enzymes remain doing its magic. The source of the enzyme is the Koji mold so it played a large role. Although you can buy commercial enzymes that convert starch to sugar but I think it won't be comparable to Koji rice flavor wise. I am not doubting you about iodine/iodized salt though. I am confident it will work just fine in aged cheese and even cured meats. It is probably one of those old wives tale. It seemed to me you were downplaying the role of cultures/microbe in flavor and texture development regardless whether they are dead or alive. I have a blue cheese where I used Flora Danica and it only started to have a pronounced buttery flavor at almost 3 months of aging. Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. cremoris and Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis biovar diacetylactis are probably still active producing flavor compounds or their enzymes.

[mikekchar]

Yeah.  I can understand the confusion.  I'm not being very clear :-).  I'm saying that I think the enzymatic activity that produces typical cheese flavor is not related to fermentation of the bacterial culture.  While bacterial culture may contribute to flavor, the typical flavors we associate with most aged cheese come from enzymes released from *dead* bacteria, not live bacteria.  However, as usual, your links to research papers are very insightful.  I think my understanding comes from assumptions that have not been adequately tested scientifically.  It's pretty clear from those papers that there is still a lot of uncertainty about what's going on.

[Aris]

Now I understand Although the various chemicals/flavor compounds released by the bacteria while they are still alive and fermenting the cheese contributes a good deal of flavor to the finished aged cheese. That is why I use a blend of mesophilic and thermophilic cultures to get a complex flavored cheese. I usually use 16 strains and plan to only use raw milk because of more enzymes and microbial diversity. It seems cheese ripening/aging is still not fully understood to this day.