The Science of Cheese

Michael Tunick, research chemist at USDA and author of The Science of Cheese, provides some answers to questions about cheese at Wired.  Here's a couple of my favorites:

On the regional production of certain cheeses:

Here are some examples of cheeses named for their originating regions:

…Asiago comes from the Asiago plateau in Northern Italy
…Brie was birthed in the Brie region east of Paris
…Camembert is named after a village in Normandy
…Cheddar was first produced in Cheddar, Somerset County
…Gorgonzola is named after an Italian town near Naples
…Gruyère is named after a town in Switzerland
…Havarti is named after a farm north of Copenhagen
…Munster is named after a village in Alsace, France
…Roquefort is made by seven companies in and around Roquefort-sur-Soulzon, France (if a similar cheese comes from outside that area, it must be called something else, such as “blue cheese”)
…Swiss cheese originated in Switzerland’s Emmen valley, which is why it’s called Emmental or Emmentaler

Several countries have thought highly enough of cheese to have postage stamps devoted to the varieties they have developed. And one northern Italian bank maintains 300,000 wheels of Parmesan, worth $200 million, as collateral for loans.
Besides tradition, another reason for the “location, location, location” phenomenon in cheese has to do with the economics of terroir (from the French for “land”). The terroir factors affecting cheese flavor include vegetation, climate, animals, season of the year, altitude, soil, and microorganisms. In the U.S., one aspect of the economics is the back-to-the-land movement, which provided incentive for dairy farmers to produce artisanal cheeses with a “sense of place.” Another economic facet is the ability to sell in a far-off market. Before refrigeration and automobiles, Vermonters came to realize that a sturdy cheddar would survive the trip to the lucrative New York market better than a high-moisture cheese that aged quickly; Vermont specializes in cow’s milk cheddar to this day.

On giant blocks of cheese:

Speaking of big cheeses (literally), a Cheshire cheese weighing 1,235 pounds and using the milk of 900 cows was once sent by sleigh for 500 miles from Massachussetts to Washington, D.C., and presented to President Thomas Jefferson on January 1, 1802. Inscribed with “Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God,” it was called the Mammoth Cheese due to the discovery of mammoth (now known to be mastodon) bones the year before. Cautious of accepting free gifts, Jefferson paid $200 for it and displayed it in the East Room for a year. Not to be outdone, supporters of President Andrew Jackson made a 1,400-pound cheese for him in 1837.
But the largest cheese prior to the 20th century was a 22,000-pound cheddar made in Perth, Ontario, for the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. A larger, 34,591-pound cheddar cheese measuring 141.5 feet by 61.5 feet by 51.5 feet was made for the Wisconsin Pavilion at the 1964-65 World’s Fair in New York. The current record-holder however is a 56,850-pound Cheddar made in Oregon by the Federation of American Cheese-makers in 1989.

Other questions answered include why fresh cheese curds squeak (trapped air) and whether you can make cheese from human breast milk (no).  I'm a sucker for these kinds of books.  I've read about cod, salt, poisons, chemical compounds and other random things.  I'll probably end up reading about cheese.