Characteristics of blue cheese

Blue cheeses are characterized by the growth of the mould Penicillium roqueforti, giving them their typical appearance and flavor. For making the variety of blue cheeses worldwide, such as the very famous French Roquefort, English Stilton, Spanish Cabrales, Danish Danablue or Italian Gorgonzola, industrials use specific strains of the fungal ascomycete species, Penicillium roqueforti.

Originally, P. roqueforti was not inoculated during blue cheese production but contaminated the milk spontaneously with spores from the environment.

The flavor of blue cheese is characterized by compounds derived from strong proteolysis and lipolysis. The typical flavor constituents are the methyl-ketones,especially 2-heptanone, which are produced by the beta-oxydation of the free fatty acids (FFA). This transformation, which is believed to be away to diminish the FFA inhibition, is caused by the mycelium and the spore of the mold.

The mold is called Penicillium roqueforti for the famous caves in the town of Roquefort, France where blue cheese was traditionally allowed to take up the mold. Nowadays, most cheese makers inoculate the cheese with P. roqueforti spores during a process known as needling as opposed to letting the mold grow on the surface, but both techniques result in the blue veins that define blue cheese
Characteristics of blue cheese