Can you fortify cow's milk with extra cream to simulate buffalo milk?

[Dolmetscher007]

Since Cows' Milk is between 3.25 - 4% and Buffalo Milk is between 7-8%, if you want to make Mozzarella, could you not just add some additional cream to the whole milk to pull off a sort of ersatz Buffalo Mozz? I know that there is much more to milk chemistry than just % of fat and % of protein. I am sure that buffalo milk is not "just like cow milk, but with extra cream." But... would adding a half-cup of extra heavy cream (not Ultra-pasteurized) to your standard whole milk even work to make cheese, or would you end up with mozz curd and a very fatty and creamy whey because the extra cream would not "absorb" into the curd?

[River Bottom Farm]

Not 100% sure but I think the buffalo milk has larger protein structure and so will hold the extra butterfat better. I know if I add cream or don't skim enough off my whole/raw jersy milk the cream will just end up in the whey (some will stay with the cheese but only to a certain extent)

[mikekchar]

I think this does not work, essentially for the reason RBF states.  Buffalo milk has more butterfat, but it also has more protein.  As far as I know, casein is casein, though.  So it's not so much that the protein structure is larger, it's actually more that you just get more yield from Buffalo milk.

According to the USDA nutrient database, buffalo milk mozzarella has 14g protein and 18g fat.  Cow's milk mozzarella has 21g protein and 25g fat.  So you can see that the buffalo milk mozzarella is higher moisture content, but that the fat to protein ratio is about 1.3 : 1, while the fat to protein ration of cow's milk mozzarella is 1.2 : 1.  In other words, they are almost identical.

What's the *real* difference in cow's milk mozzarella to buffalo milk mozzarella?  The buffalo milk tastes different ;-)  If you want to get a similar protein to fat ratio, I would simply use Jersey milk, however it will still be quite different  I think.