Invited review: Manufacture and quality control of mozzarella cheese-Scientific and technological advances

Mozzarella cheese is one of the most popular cheeses consumed on pizza worldwide. In commercial markets, mozzarella cheese is sold in a variety of formats (e.g., shreds, slices, blocks), and the functionality of mozzarella cheese is determined based on the end use. For example, for pizza applications, mozzarella cheese block is converted into shreds in the factory setting or at home. For minimizing losses during conversion, it is important to have optimum material properties in the block at low temperatures. Good-quality mozzarella cheese shreds are expected to melt, form long stretch, release right amount of free oil, and form an optimum level of brown spots when baked on a pizza. There are various factors controlling baking performance of mozzarella cheese including manufacturing process, composition, and aging. For example, during the first few weeks of refrigerated storage, the unmelted cheese becomes softer, whereas the melted cheese becomes more viscous, less elastic, and extremely stretchable due to continuous breakdown of casein matrix. Thus, the cheese achieves optimum pizza functionality during the aging process. Baking performance of mozzarella cheese can be affected by various factors such as cheese milk, composition of cheese (especially calcium, lactose, and galactose content), proteolysis, and starter cultures, therefore, making it an intriguing research domain by the food industry to deliver improved and consistent products. This review presents the status of manufacturing technology, practices, quality evaluation, and structure-function relationship in mozzarella cheese and their potential use for the cheese industry. Major findings of this review indicate use of waterless extrusion technology to improve process efficiency and performance shelf life, changing formulation to optimize baking performance and use of novel user-friendly techniques for performance evaluation.