192. Volatile acids of cheese. I. Retentive power of cheese and its constituents

Abstract

1. Direct steam distillation of cheese does not give a true figure for the volatile acids present in cheese. 2. The fat portion of a cheese has a retarding effect on the distillation of higher volatile fatty acids, although it is possible that a complete recovery of the acid may be effected from the fat if the distillation were to be continued for a sufficiently long period. 3. Cheese protein is capable of a permanent retention of a part of some of the acids present, it being impossible to extract these portions by continued distillation. 4. If direct steam distillation of a cheese is to be carried out the results seem to indicate that by collecting only “twice the original volume” a more accurate picture is gained of the distribution of the acids present in the cheese than would be obtained by distilling to “5 times original volume”, since the retention factor of the protein becomes more significant after “twice the volume” (Fig. 2).