The Portland daily press., 1876-12-13
Roquefort Sheep and Cheese.

The animal is remarkable in appearance
with fiat and narrow breast, very poor
shoulders and legs, immense sides and vast
development Of milk. The lambs are weaned
so early for commercial reasons that they
never grow into fine form, and when sold
at certain age they are worth no more than
few francs. Nevertheless, for the produc-
ton of Roqnefort cheese their milk is match
less. An experiment was made some years
ago With the Merino breed, but it failed alto
eether. Few have any idea of the subtleties
involved In, or of the pains bestowed upon its
manufacture. 1t is not to quantity, but to
fine quality OF milk that the cheese farmer
looks, and, as might be expected, the tradi-
tions of this industry are its laws. One is not
to let the sheep associate with oxen or goats.
They are the aristocracy of LaIzac, aud keep
other creatures at distance. 1t is milking
time morning, though it will be milking time
again in the evening. Hundreds-thousands
it you could see them-swarm in the sweet
meadows each carrying very short-legged,
aby-looking stool, each catching victim.
But the pretty dairy pail of Holland, of snow
white wood, with glistening copper hoops, is
represented here by an ugly iron pot lined
with tin. Once full, it is hurried off to the
farm house, skinned, strained, warmed to a
degree according to the weather, though new
er above boiling point, thrown into enormous
deep vase-shaped pans, and left to accumu-
late its cream. With a keenness of judgment
only to be acquired by lifelong and even,
perhaps, an hereditary experience, the dairy
man distinguishes between the quality good
for butter and the quality good for cheese.
Then the mornings and evenings milk are
blended, and number of young damsels,
laughing like the girls of Clusium, stir these
that the covers are put on, and "mother of
CHEESE" is left to take little rest, not how
ever, before the due proportion of rennet has
been added. I do not feel bound to follow
the entire series of operations, the breaking,
the squeezing and filtering of the curd, the
moulding, milling and draining; but was in
terested in what followed-the rubbing of the
new cheese with mouldy bread, which indeed
enters into the composition of the cheese
and helps to give it the green ripeness that is
essential. They are next arranged on grooved
shelves to allow of whatever milk remains
running off; they are turned twice day for
about week; then they go to the drying
room, twilight excavation among the caves
OF Cambalou, always facing the north. ex-
quisitely clean, with metal or canvass blinds
to keep out the husband flies, and fitted with
linen covered shelves, where the cheeses re-
main, kept warm by pals of boiling water in
the cellar. But they are far from being done
with yet. may as well say word however,
concerning the mouldy bread. The highest
importance is attached to it. 1t is made ''on
the premises" from the finest wheat, or
March barley, with large quantity of the
strongest yeast. kneaded beyond all necessity,
except in the cheese-maker's eye, baked
thoroughly deprived OF its crust, pounded in
q mortar, allowed to be in damp place until
every crumb is touched, sifted and, so pre-
pared it actually grows through the cheese like |
plant. Indeed the botanists have given it a |
name. 1 inquired whether it was true, as / |
had seen stated at Paris, that piece of old |
cheese was sometimes introduced into the |
new as it were, to inocculate it. The answer |
was never! That would be ruinr' For |
you see Rogue would be nothing without |
frontage de Roquefort. On the passage from
the drying vaults to the cellars, the same
delicate care follows the Partisan bon bouche;
1t is packed with as much solicitude as though |
it were Venetian glass, in cases of special con-
struction, and loaded in vans slung below the |
axles instead of above them, so that the crust |
may not be broken by the jolting of the |
wheels. And the transit must be made by
night, so that the heat of the sun may not |
infict these tender tit bits. Arrived at the |
''scale chamber" they are examined like the |
wounded after battle, the spoiled put aside,
the rest weighed, all registered. Geographic |
cal MdUdzine |