Chinese scientists say they have discovered the world’s oldest known cheese. The cheese dates back around 3,500 years and was buried alongside mummies in the Tarim Basin in far west China.
The team found the DNA of goats and fermenting microbes from Bronze Age dairy samples. The samples were scattered around the necks of mummies in the Xiaohe cemetery in Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.
“It appears that the Xiaohe population actively adopted animal husbandry from steppe culture,” the new study revealed. Steppe means a large area of land with grass but no trees.
“The related fermented milk product, kefir cheese, became an important part of the Xiaohe culture and spread further in inland East Asia”.
The researchers published their findings in the peer-reviewed journal Cell.
Kefir is a fermented drink made with milk and kefir grains. It is drained to produce a soft cheese.
