Don’t feel bleu, throw a feta or act capricious. January 20th is a gouda day to kummin over and have some cheddar or asiago or fontina! It’s National Cheese Lover’s Day.
There is no firm evidence how cheese making was discovered, but legend tells us it was likely chance that the first cheese was created. Thousands of years ago, milk was transported and stored in sheep stomachs. Left to sit a few days the proteins would separate into curds and whey.
From there, preserving the solids with salt may have seemed a logical next step. Salt was a highly valued preservative in ancient times.
The earliest record of cheese making dates back to 5,500 BCE in what is now Poland. Today there are over 1,400 varieties of cheese.
- Last year scientists and experts named Vieux Boulogne as the smelliest cheese. The scientists and experts at Cranfield University in Bedford used an electronic nose device and a panel of human testers to carry out test. The cheese which comes from Boulogne sur Mer in Northern France is a soft cheese and beat 14 other cheeses.
- Cheese is produced more than the combined world-wide production of coffee, chocolate and tea put together. Now, that’s a lot of cheese. A mighty 20 million metric tons of cheese is produced worldwide each year.
- Pizza giant, Pizza Hut uses more cheese than any other fast food outlet. Each year it reportedly uses 300 million pounds of cheese.
- The people of Greece are the largest consumers of cheese in the world and eat around 27.3kg of the stuff every year. Their firm favorite being feta.
- The first cheese factory opened in 1815 in Switzerland. With the introduction of industrial production, industrialization of one of our favorite foods began. Cheese was rolled out on a global scale.
- In the 17th century, people thought that eating cheese would make you, er, less intelligent.
- The nickname “big cheese” was first used to refer to people who could afford to buy a wheel of cheese.
- Wisconsin produces about 2 billion pounds of cheese per year, and it’s the home of 126 cheese plants.
- Eating certain types of cheese—such as cheddar, Swiss, bleu and others—right after a meal is said to help prevent tooth decay and help you sleep.
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