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 |    Not for the faint of art. |
| Sweet dreams are made of cheese... The Next Generation of American Cheese  The founders of New School cheese say they are making the first “quality” American cheese When I visited England some years ago, it took me a while to convince my British friends that there was (still is) a vibrant craft beer community in the US; they thought we all drank Bud Light or whatever. Then they asked, "What about wine?" I was like, "Oh, definitely. Wineries everywhere, some even as good as or better than the French." (That didn't take nearly as much convincing.) But then came the question I was dreading: "And cheese?" I hung my head in shame. Yes, some small, local artisanal cheeses exist, but they're not nearly as widely distributed as the biggies are. Wisconsin notwithstanding, most of the actual cheese produced in the US is a copy of various European styles, such as cheddar, brie, or Swiss. A few are uniquely American... sort of. Monterey Jack might be an exception, though it was developed in an area that was, at the time, controlled by Spain via Mexico (which is part of North America, but despite the existence of it and Canada, when people say American, they generally mean US.) And then there's Colby, from Wisconsin, but it's basically cheddar that's mild enough to be suitable for a bland Midwestern palate, which generally thinks mayonnaise is quite enough spice. The other big cheese in America is American, which in its most common form is a factory food. My point being that when it comes to "craft" (as opposed to Kraft) products, cheese has a long way to go in the US if it's going to catch up to wine and beer. This article is, as the headline suggests, a step in that direction. The joke that people love to hate — or hate to love — American cheese is outdated. We’re at the point where we can all admit it’s good. No. No, we are not. Because I do not admit any such thing. At best, it's a pale (sometimes literally) shadow of cheddar. You ever top a burger with fresh mozzarella and watch as it sits there and does everything but melt? No, because the only cheese I admit on a burger, if I have any kind of choice, is cheddar or Swiss. Maybe provolone. If I don't have any kind of choice, I put up with American. Ever try putting a slice of cheddar on ramen only to witness the puddles of fat sweat out from the clumpy solids? No, because who the fuck puts cheddar on ramen? American cheese is not a quality product. Finally, something I can agree with. In fact, its lack of quality is often the point, a grand embrace of the lowbrow and cheap that is the cornerstone of so much comfort food. I don't believe in the concept of comfort food. Food is either delicious, or it's not. Sometimes somewhere in between. The closest I come to the concept is making easy meals, like sandwiches. In fact, Kraft Singles, the standard for American cheese, cannot legally be called American cheese, or even “cheese food,” due to being made with milk protein concentrate and consisting of less than 51 percent actual cheese. (The company itself refers to the product as a “pasteurized prepared cheese product.”) Cheese may be the first ingredient, but the slices are mostly made of whey, skim milk, and various preservatives. I've described Singles as a product whose only relationship with cheese is that the truck passed a dairy farm on the way out from the factory. That may be an exaggeration, but not by much. For decades, the options have been to either accept American cheese as it is, or instead eat better-quality artisanal cheeses that, while delicious, are never quite right. You shut your disgusting mouth. Last fall, Greenspan and his friend Alan Leavitt, who has worked at and invested in early-stage packaged consumer goods companies, launched New School, what they claim is the first attempt by anyone to make a “quality” American cheese. Eh. Maybe. Depends on definition of quality. Pre-industrialization, it was some bastard variant or mixture of cheddar or Colby. “It’s hard to imagine processed food being good. What’s good? Does that mean taste? Does it mean quality? Does it mean health?” asks Helen Veit, associate professor of history at Michigan State University, who specializes in food and nutrition of the 19th and 20th centuries. Today, most Americans’ blanket assumption about processed foods is that they are unhealthy. But during the advent of many food processing methods in the early 20th century, “processed” wasn’t really a bad word. A processed food could actually be made well. Or at least better than what exists now. I've touched on this subject before. "Processed" is now a buzzword, as in "processed food is bad for you." But when you start thinking about what "processed" really means, there are all kinds of gray areas. It's the new "don't eat anything you can't pronounce," which as I've noted in the past, does nothing but encourage ignorance. “The initial intent of this product was to improve shelf-life of cheese shipped to warmer climates,” Zey Ustunol wrote in a 2009 article for the Michigan Dairy Review. In Illinois, James Kraft was working on a similar product, and received patents for processed cheese in 1916 and 1921, the latter of which was for processed cheese packaged in a loaf form. The whole purpose of cheese in the first place was to preserve milk in a time before refrigeration. This is, I think, analogous to the addition of hops to beer, which had the effect of preserving it for a longer period of time. What’s more, a new generation raised on processed food turned a more critical eye toward the entire food industry. “The broad skepticism about the benefits of processing was really a product of the 1960s and ’70s...” You might recognize this period as also being when the use of refrigeration in the US and other industrialized nations really exploded. It is true that many preservatives aren't ideal in a person's diet, and refrigeration liberated us from so much need for preservatives. There's a lot more at the link, and despite my conviction that the author must have lost their taste buds due to COVID, there's some interesting stuff in there. Including the shocking revelation that artisanal cheese is going to cost more than "pasteurized prepared cheese product." Well... duh. If nothing else, read the end of the article for a truly groan-worthy pun. |
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