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a b s t r a c tWe explored anisotropy of mozzarella cheese: its presence is debated in the literature. Tensile testing proved a good method because the location and mode of failure were clear. Mozzarella cheese cut direct from the block showed no significant anisotropy, though confocal microscopy showed good structure alignment at a microscale. Deliberately elongated mozzarella cheese showed strong anisotropy with tensile strength in the elongation or fibre direction~3.5Â that perpendicular to the fibres. Temperature of elongation had a marked impact on anisotropy with maximum anisotropy after elongation at 70 C. We suggest the disagreement on anisotropy in the literature is related to the method of packing the mozzarella cheese into a block after the stretching stage of manufacture. Tensile stress/strain curves in the fibre direction showed marked strain hardening with modulus just before fracture~2.1Â that of the initial sample, but no strain hardening was found perpendicular to the fibre direction.

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