Effect of feeding systems on aromatic characteristics of buffalo mozzarella cheese

Aim of this study was to evaluated the effect of feeding systems (hay vs ray-grass silage) on volatile compounds profiles of mozzarella cheese. Three mozzarella cheese making trials for each experimental group were conducted at our dairy technology laboratory. Mozzarella cheese was manufactured from whole raw water buffalo milk with the addition of natural starter. Volatile compounds were extracted by “purge and trap” system coupled to a gas chromatograph and detected operating with a mass-selective detector (Ciccioli et al., 2004) A total of 84 compounds of the following chemical families were detected: hydrocarbons, fatty acids, esters, alcohols, aldehydes, ketones and terpenes. The data overall indicated difference between the aromatic profiles of mozzarella cheese as consequence of feeding systems. Thus, differences in mozzarella cheese flavour are primarily caused by concentration differences of a common set of flavour compounds, rather than by the occurrence of compounds uniquely associated with a particular feed