With just a crumb of stilton giving off a powerful whiff, not everyone could stomach the prospect of six months working in a laboratory filled with blue cheese. But Kostas Gkatzionis, a researcher at the University of Northampton who is midway through a project doing just that, says it's not as smelly as it sounds.
"Researching food in the academic environment is completely different to the way people imagine," explains Gkatzionis, who spent part of his career working on food microbiology and flavour chemistry for the dairy industry before returning to academia. "We often don't come into contact with any blue cheeses at all – we work with their DNA, so the only sign of the cheese can be just some of its DNA in a small amount of aqueous solution on a bench."
As universities struggle with austerity measures, cheese might not sound like the biggest problem for Britain's brightest brains to grapple with, but with the market for blue cheese in the UK alone worth £33m a year, Gkatzionis says his work could have a big impact. "British blue cheeses are very important to the economy of the Midlands, and the British food market in general, but varieties like roquefort from France, Danish blue from Denmark and gorgonzola from Italy dominate even in Britain," he explains.
"But British blue cheeses have attracted very little scientific attention compared to varieties in other countries. So it's important to support blue cheese-makers here with research and development to make them more competitive, take them outside the British borders and increase their share in the global market."
To that end, Gkatzionis is researching how the cheeses' microorganisms work. His focus is on the activity of "secondary flora" – microorganisms that are not added or controlled by dairies or farmers, but simply appear during production. These flora have a significant impact on the flavour of the final product, but can also give the cheese a bitter smell and damage the formation of blue veins.
"Until now, the general understanding has always been that blue cheese aroma is promoted by a starter mould put in by the farmer or dairy, which in the case of blue cheese is Penicillium roqueforti," Gkatzionis explains. "Producers focus on the starter mould and its role forming blue veins in the core of the cheese and creating the aroma. But our research shows secondary flora is as important in developing the flavour." Gkatzionis noticed that the crust of the cheese gave off aroma compounds in higher quantities than the blue veins in the cheese, despite the absence of that starter mould P. roqueforti in the crust. He then realised that yeasts have a big impact on blue-cheese flavour. "Different yeast species populate different sections of the cheese," Gkatzionis points out. "Some are likely to be found next to the blue veins, while others are only in sections where the mould is not present." The academic now intends to investigate that phenomenon to see if there is a natural compound produced by the mould-less parts of the cheese that be used in other varieties to prevent them going mouldy.
The project – which is being run in conjunction with the University of Nottingham as well as Northampton – is supported by Food and Drink iNet, a regional body that co-ordinates local businesses and universities working in the grocery sector. It includes input from local cheese businesses such as Stichelton Dairy, whose cheese is sold around the world via Neal's Yard Dairy, which Gkatzionis hopes will increase its potential impact. "We will make our results available to blue-cheese producers and hope that by better understanding blue cheese flavour development they will be able to control the production of quality cheese better," he says.
"If the production work helps Britain's blue cheese become more popular around the world, it would also make the industry less vulnerable in times of recession and decreased internal demand," he adds. "In the UK, for example, blue cheese is strongly associated with Christmas, but increased exporting could balance the demand for products throughout the year."
Whilst Gkatzionis's lab work involved more grappling with test tubes than bits of rind, his research did involve some experimental trips to the supermarket cheese aisle. "It is really important to understand the characteristics of a food product, such as the flavour, texture, colour, appearance, even the packaging that is used, before we conduct any research on it," he says. "Whatever we find has to be able to be linked back to the original product and must be able to be used for its further development and improvement."
Anyone listening to Gkatzionis could be excused for thinking he was a long-term, evangelical blue cheese fan. "It's impossible for anyone not to find a blue cheese they like," he says, before adding: "Anyone who thinks they do not like blue cheese just hasn't found a variety that suits their taste yet."
But in fact the Greek-born academic wasn't always such a fan. "Coming from Greece, a market where blue cheeses are not well known, I knew very little about them at first," he admits. "I used to think that blue cheeses stank. Because of my background, I was originally looking to study the flavour production of microorganisms in feta cheese for my PhD, but my supervisor told me about the complexity of the microbiology of stilton, and I realised blue cheeses were ideal for studying the interactions of microorganisms and their flavour production. Now," Gkatzionis proudly adds, "I can distinguish blue cheeses just by taste."
