Maggie Becher grew up in Somerset, WI before heading off to South Dakota State University to do her undergrad. But Wisconsin called her home and now she can be found on the UW Madison campus. In her 4th year as a graduate student Maggie is most often found at the Center For Dairy Research working in the Lucey lab. Her research is all about keeping curds squeaky and string cheese as peelable as possible.
With the abundant cheese plants in Wisconsin, for most people it’s not too hard to find squeaky fresh cheese curds and feathery string cheese. However, that’s not the case once you get outside of America’s Dairyland, and working to extend the special characteristics of the fresh cheeses, will only help convert more people to these dairy products for their snacking needs.
Maggie says that much of her research is driven by the desire of consumers to have a full sensory experience while enjoying a tasty dairy snack. So far in her research Maggie has been able to narrow down what causes the stringiness of string cheese and is now working on ways to prolong the changes that happen as the cheese ages.
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