The Chinese word 乳酪 (rǔlào) for "cheese" is a semantically transparent compound formed by combining two characters: 乳 (rǔ), meaning "milk", and 酪 (lào), a historical term for fermented dairy products or thick, jellied foods. The word construction follows a modifier-head structure common in Chinese, where 乳 ("milk") specifies the material or source, and 酪 ("fermented dairy") denotes the category, effectively creating the meaning "a fermented/jellied product from milk". This formation directly reflects the food's origin and traditional preparation method, making its meaning intuitively clear from its components.