The impact of reduced sodium chloride content on Cheddar cheese quality

Effect of salt and fat reduction on the composition, lactose metabolism, water activity and microbiology of Cheddar cheese

“…Protein content increased significantly with fat reduction but was unaffected by salt content. The above compositional changes concur with the separate effects of fat and salt reduction reported in previous studies on cheeses such as Cheddar, Mozzarella and Gouda (Arboatti et al 2014;Czarnacka-Szymani and JezewskaZychowicz 2015;Kelly et al 1996;Rulikowska et al 2013;Tunick et al 1993). Hence, reducing salt and fat had opposite effects on contents of MNFS and LA:P, which, along with S/M, are considered to be key compositional parameters in controlling Cheddar cheese quality (Lawrence et al 2004).…”

“…The key approaches have been reviewed by Johnson et al (2009) and Møller (2012) and include reducing the volume fraction of the casein network by increasing moisture level or the inclusion of filler materials such as microparticulated whey proteins and hydrocolloid-based materials; reducing the degree of casein cross-linking through reduction in calcium phosphate level; increasing casein hydrolysis; the use of improved starter culture and starter-culture adjuncts, increasing proteolysis and adding fat-derived flavours. Similarly, the effects of reducing salt content have been extensively reported, with most emphasis on full-fat cheese (Arboatti et al 2014;Czarnacka-Szymani and Jezewska-Zychowicz 2015;Ganesan et al 2014;Lu and McMahon 2015;Ma et al 2013;Murtaza et al 2014;Pastorino et al 2003;Rulikowska et al 2013). Apart from the potential risk to safety and microbiological quality (Labrie et al 2014), a major issue with reduced-salt cheeses is low pH, which is conducive to higher residual coagulant activity, greater hydrolysis of β-casein and an increased risk of bitterness (Guinee and Fox 2004).…”

Substitution of sodium chloride by potassium chloride in São João cheese of Pico Island

“…São João cheeses salted with NaCl/KCl mixtures and KCl revealed significantly (p < 0.05) lower cohesiveness than the full-sodium control, similar to Ayyash et al (2011) for Halloumi cheese but in contrast to Katsiari et al (1998) who report an almost equal cohesiveness among the several NaCl/KCl-salted Kefalograviera cheeses. The decrease observed in the present study can be probably attributed to less calcium displacement (Cruz et al 2011;Rulikowska et al 2013) promoted not only by increasing the amount of added potassium but also by the proteolysis increase as well (Ayyash et al 2011). This effect may suggest that KCl is not as effective as is NaCl by itself in terms of technology, throughout ripening.…”

“…Significant (p < 0.05) differences were found in hardness and cohesiveness textural parameters among experimental cheeses at 17 days of ripening, while adhesiveness (p > 0.05) was not different. São João cheese E salted with KCl was significantly harder (p < 0.05) than the control and cheese salted with (3:1) NaCl/KCl mixtures, suggesting that cheeses salted with KCl lead to a less calcium displacement and probably to higher phosphorous content due to the lack of solubilization, as it can be seen by the decreased in MNFS and S/M among salt treatments, at 17 days of ripening in Table 1 (Rulikowska et al 2013). The present findings do not agree with those reported by Katsiari et al (1997Katsiari et al ( , 1998 and Ayyash et al (2011), who observed a decreasing trend for the hardness for Feta, Kefalograviera, and Halloumi cheeses, respectively.…”

“…The calcium content of all cheeses was similar (p > 0.05), in accordance with Lindsay et al (1982) and Katsiari et al (1997Katsiari et al ( , 1998, for Cheddar, Feta, and Kefalograviera cheeses, respectively. Nevertheless, most of reduced-sodium experimental cheeses had slightly higher (p > 0.05) Ca contents at each point throughout ripening, probably because of the less Ca displacement (Rulikowska et al 2013) with the increasing added amounts of KCl, probably because of likely difficulties in the ion exchange of K + with Ca 2+ for the formation of K + -phosphate ionic linkage, once potassium ion has a higher atomic mass than sodium ion.…”