Amino Acid Catabolism and Its Relationship to Cheese Flavor Outcomes

Abstract Defined flavor profiles of cheeses and long lists of associated compounds have expanded our vista of the flavor formation mechanisms. Beginning from a review by Schormuller in 1968 as a particularly useful starting point for these pathways, we seek to recognize the past work in this arena more specifically within the last decade, of the possibilities of novel discovery, and of the necessary directions for the future of this arena. Toward this direction, a definitive body of work on defining entire pathways for beneficial flavor production from amino acid metabolism is still in progress. Formation of selective flavor compounds such as fatty acids and volatile sulfurs and related flavor production mechanisms attributable to bacterial metabolism and the likely candidate substrates from the available menu of lactose, milk lipids, and milk protein will be extensively discussed. Focus on metabolic reconstruction from genomic sequence and identifying molecules by genome restriction are recommended as useful tools to gain novel perspectives on alternate metabolic pathways.