English

Abstract

Restaurants and pizza makers in Pakistan demand a cheese that has ability to melt, stretch with a characteristics flavor and less free oil formation while applied on pizza dough. The desired characteristics can be obtained with proper amalgamation of fresh and ripened cheeses. Therefore, the present research was planned to prepare Pizza cheese blends (PCB) from fresh Mozzarella and ripened (2 and 4 months) Cheddar cheese. Seven Pizza cheese blends were prepared with fresh Mozzarella and ripened (2 and 4 months) Cheddar cheese. The quality of Pizza cheese blends were evaluated by measuring chemical composition, proteolysis, intact casein and organic acids contents. The rate of proteolysis (pH 4.6-soluble and TCA-soluble nitrogen) was rapid in PCB made with higher level of four months ripened Cheddar cheese. Electrophoresis (Urea PAGE) and High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) analysis indicated reduced intact casein in PCB that has higher level of aged (4 months) Cheddar cheese. Mean abundances indicated significant change in organic acid contents of PCB. In conclusion, significant variation was observed for proteolysis, intact casein and organic acids production with the difference in percentages and ages of cheeses. The prevalence of a comparatively large amount of variability in technological properties of Pizza cheese was confirmed. This blending of cheeses provides new insight to cheese industries which directs new strategies to improve the characteristics of Pizza cheese.