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> Properly formed eyes are a mark of quality. Except when I asked someone who makes cheese in Switzerland, they told me almost the opposite (and mostly that th

by chris_va 11mo ago

> Properly formed eyes are a mark of quality. Except when I asked someone who makes cheese in Switzerland, they told me almost the opposite (and mostly that they export the junk cheese to the US and keep the good stuff). As an aside, what are the odds this article was written by AI? It has that feel (minus random bolding and bullet points).

rootusrootus 11mo ago
Why on Earth would they intentionally export only their garbage cheese? Then the world will only know them for that. The holes in modern Emmental cheese are created intentionally. In Switzerland the additive used to create them is forbidden. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmental_cheese#Natural_holes_in_cheese https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmental_cheese#Natural_holes_...
- helicone 11mo ago
  because their garbage cheese is still miles better than what other people make, and there's no cheese market large enough and rich enough to pay them what their top cheese is worth, so its worth more just to keep it for themselves
  - rootusrootus 11mo ago
    > there's no cheese market large enough and rich enough to pay them what their top cheese is worth That sounds like the market expressing the collective opinion that their cheese is not miles better than what other people make. On a related note, the best seems to be considered Emmentaler AOC, and it does not seem especially difficult to purchase outside of Switzerland.
    - eru 11mo ago
      Emmentaler is a fairly common cheese. I would expect the 'best' to be some obscure cheese that neither you nor me have heard of. I'm quite fond of the Belper Knolle, but even that ain't particularly obscure.
      - JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
        > would expect the 'best' to be some obscure cheese that neither you nor me have heard of …why? Gruyère and Appenzeller are delicious. They’re also well known. My favorite blue in the world is Point Reyes. Controversial when I’m in France. But not some secret undiscovered jewel.
      - rootusrootus 11mo ago
        If obscurity is an important factor, there are going to be as many 'best' cheeses as there are people. For this discussion to make any sense we need something of a consensus opinion, for which Emmentaler gets nominated often enough.
  - eru 11mo ago
    > because their garbage cheese is still miles better than what other people make, [...] Some other people, maybe. But not all other people.
- JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
  > Why on Earth would they intentionally export only their garbage cheese? This usually happens when one population is discerning and the other is not.
  - rootusrootus 11mo ago
    I don't know what to make of that statement. It is arrogant, at least. Are you trashing just the 340 million people in the US with this comment, or everybody not-Swiss?
    - JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
      > It is arrogant, at least. Are you trashing just the 340 million people in the US with this comment, or everybody not-Swiss? You’re parsing discernment as a value judgement. Don’t do that. New York City has America’s best bagels. This is because OG bagels are best fresh, and making them fresh multiple times a day takes a lot of work. (They stale super fast because gluten is a bastard. Hence toasting.) To pay for that work at a non-ludicrous cost per bagel, you need lots of reliable demand. That really only happens when you have an ecosystem of people who have been eating bagels all their lives made by folks who have been making them similarly. You don’t find great bagels outside New York (at an affordable price) because the demand isn’t there. Meanwhile, if you haven’t spent time in New York, you probably don’t know (or care about) the difference. Which means you’re unlikely to give excess patronage to anyone who tries to do it right if they try to do it near you. That doesn’t make anyone outside New York who likes their local bagel wrong; it’s just that economies make it very difficult, and frankly pointless, to replicate the New York bagel elsewhere. If the people in your town will pay extra only for great cheese and the guys across the pond will pay the same price for mediocre and great cheeses, the deck is stacked. (And to be clear, you can find great Swiss cheeses in America. What you can’t is great Swiss wines.)
      - rootusrootus 11mo ago
        I'm definitely not on the same wavelength as you this evening. > New York City has America’s best bagels That's a big claim. You say it's because they are best fresh -- are you saying that the rest of the country does not have anybody who makes fresh bagels? That's what I get from your first comment, but then you moved the goalposts a bit by qualifying "at an affordable price." So maybe other cities in the US do have bagels that are just as good as NYC but they are more expensive? I see there is one final qualification you've made: "the New York bagel." In that case, obviously NYC has the best New York bagel ;).
- tekno45 11mo ago
  so a tourist will go to switzerland love it and hate it once they're home? very good export business
  - deleted 11mo ago
    [deleted]
  - com2kid 11mo ago
    That's how I felt about eggs after visiting Japan. American eggs are bland and tasteless in comparison. Backyard eggs are a general exception to that rule.
- schainks 11mo ago
  Same reason why it’s hard to buy a decent Swiss wine: the good stuff makes it into bellies before it gets to the border!
- PetitPrince 11mo ago
  Different countries have different tastes (Coca Cola has a different syrup mixture for each countries for instance). There's a YouTube video from a franco-japanese guy who interview a Japanese cheese maker. He was trained by a Swiss person (but in the US, of all places) and softly complained that Japanese palate favored more bland cheese compared to what he experienced. So it makes sense for a Swiss cheese maker to export a more marketable cheese, which are generally less strong and younger than the local one. Just like there's an export Guinness or Kilkenny that different from one you'd get in Ireland. Of note: cheese label are strongly protected in Europe; you cannot legally sell an AOP labelled cheese without adhering to strict guideline about the raw material (including geographic provenance) and processing.
  - marklubi 11mo ago
    Similar thing with orange juice. The producers add 'flavor packs' to adjust the taste for different regions of the US. My son and I travel all over the US for various competitions, and there are certain regions where he refuses to get OJ because of the flavor differences.
    - MiddleEndian 11mo ago
      I never looked into why, but when I moved from Boston to Seattle, I noticed dairy products (milk, cottage cheese) tasted different in Seattle. Confirmed it again when I moved back to Boston.
      - marklubi 11mo ago
        Haven't noticed that one. Oxidation perhaps, or maybe salt in the air based on the locations? West coast food (particularly oysters) seems to be a little bit more salty/briny.
        PetitPrince 11mo ago
        What you feed your cattle change how their milk taste; where I live there's a noticeable different between summer (where cows graze on alpine meadows) and winter (hay) milk.
- robocat 11mo ago
  Modern America doesn't seem to have much of a culture of cheese. I've just visited New Orleans, and the selection of cheese available in supermarkets was extremely limited. I recall the same issue from past visits elsewhere in the US. The fist time I visited I was horrified to see fake Bega cheese. For more choice in New Orleans I would have needed to go to a cheese shop/restaurant chain called the St James Cheese Company (I didn't visit it). I watched someone cooking a hamburger grab a slice of processed cheese (looked like a standard individual plastic packaged slice to me) and place it on top of the burger to melt (admittedly it turned out fine). Oh, and all the milk I found in New Orleans was ultra-pasteurised (abominable taste) - I didn't see any standard/HTST pasteurized milk. Apparently shelflife is more important than taste. For comparison, Supermarket milk is pasteurized here in NZ (not ultra except for longlife tetrapack) and unpasteurized milk is available in Christchurch (not at supermarket, I think in a shop in St Martins or from dairy 30km out of Christchurch). I admit that here in Christchurch for better imported cheeses I need to go to a cheesemonger. At my local supermarket today I didn't buy a yummy local aged gouda (Meyer) because it was USD40/kg : instead I bought 1 double-cream Brie (Mainland), 1 goatsmilk feta (Foodsnob - Bulgarian - cheap on special), and some "smoked flavour" processed cheese slices (Chesdale - plastic but I like it!). For Emmentaler, the supermarket has "Swiss cheese" which isn't great. They have an imported brand from Germany Emborg Emmentaler Swiss Cheese block 200g NZD9.69 (USD12.7/lb) which you wouldn't buy for its flavour.
  - PopAlongKid 11mo ago
    >grab a slice of processed cheese (looked like a standard individual plastic packaged slice to me) Kraft makes a plastic wrapped slice that is "cheese food", however they also make an American cheese slice that is actual cheese. I suspect you saw the latter. https://www.kraftheinz.com/kraft-deli-deluxe/products/00021000602605-deli-deluxe-american-cheese-slices https://www.kraftheinz.com/kraft-deli-deluxe/products/000210...
  - soulofmischief 11mo ago
    To be fair, Louisiana, for all its talk of culinary tradition, really doesn't have a lot to offer in terms of variety, compared to other states that I have lived in. This state is a backwater shithole that reminds me of a war-torn Eastern European country, even in New Orleans (which to be fair, is quite small) I wouldn't let it be a typical example of the kind of variety you can find in a modern American city.
bryanrasmussen 11mo ago
I have heard that Denmark exports their best pigs and leaves the second best for home. Not sure why that should be any truer than what you heard regarding Switzerland and their strategy, but they seem to represent two differing strategies about how to best profit from strong points, it would be nice to figure if either is the dominant one. Perhaps we can ask Italy what they do with tomatoes and parmigiano.
- mattclarkdotnet 11mo ago
  In two minds as to your sarcasm level. Anyone who has eaten bacon in Denmark or Raclette in Switzerland or a fresh pasta sauce in Italy could testify that the best stays home
  - Maxion 11mo ago
    I am so confused as to why everyone is talking about Switzerland, the country, acting in unison when it comes to exports. That's not really how it works... Some Swiss companies are more export focused, others are more domestically focused. There's no single central agency that goes around the country and grades cheese manufacturers and creameries and forces some to export, and others to sell to local grocery store chains...
    - shermantanktop 11mo ago
      You sure about that? Swiss agriculture is tightly controlled.
  - bryanrasmussen 11mo ago
    I heard it from a Dane, but obviously your taste buds have allowed you to take a statistically meaningful sampling, that's pretty lucky. The reason why I might give it some credence is twofold 1. I would suppose travel from point X to point Y might lead to degradation of quality and thus the top quality leaving at X might be passable when arriving at Y. 2. I suppose there are different income levels involved, Danes are pretty parsimonious. I don't think most of them actually care about having the best, they care about having passable quality which is of course much better than a middle class person will have access to in the U.S, but perhaps they export the best and premium because obviously with a world wide market there would be enough really upper-scale rich buyers to make it worthwhile to do so. I have to say I don't really care much, but I think there may be scenarios in which a large portion of the best quality of a nation's produce gets exported (obviously not all of it, but a large portion) and am interested in that as how economics works. As far as anecdotes however, my Italian ex-wife said the best Italian food she ever had was at a fancy restaurant we went to in Prague. I thought it was good but I don't much care past a certain point, so I didn't notice. My favorite was a small restaurant in Vomero that just made the same two dishes all day long and all the workers came to eat there. I like Danish pork, but generally stuff like flæskesteg, which historically was yes, a luxury good, but a luxury good for peasants. So I think probably not the best. Yes definitely anything I have eaten in Danish or Italian dishes in their homeland was better than what I ate in those culinary traditions in the U.S or England, but I doubt that was because I had a great sampling to choose from and could decide what was what based only on my experience.
palata 11mo ago
"Swiss cheese" is not... a "Swiss" cheese. It's just the name of a cheese, but that cheese does not come from Switzerland.
- JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
  > that cheese does not come from Switzerland The canton of Bern makes an absolutely excellent Emmantaler. It’s the original Swiss cheese as brought to America by 19th-century Swiss immigrants to Wisconsin.
  - palata 11mo ago
    Emmentaler is a cheese originally from Switzerland, though many other countries now make a cheese that they call like that. "Swiss cheese" is supposed to be similar to Emmentaler (or inspired from it?). But the fact that Swiss Emmentaler counts as Swiss cheese does not mean that Swiss cheese counts as Emmentaler, or is from Switzerland at all.
  - mda 11mo ago
    I always found Emmentaler bland and boring compared to many others in Switzerland, I wish the immigrants brought something better.
    - deleted 11mo ago
      [deleted]
JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
> they told me almost the opposite For Emmantaler? Or cheese in general?
elzbardico 11mo ago
Don’t trust everything people tell you
mymacbook 11mo ago
I don’t think this is true, wherever I’ve traveled the opposite has held - the finest materials are exported which is sad for the locals. Right away Wool stuck out as an example from Peru. I naively thought that going to Peru would guarantee me the finest wool at the best prices. Anyway I’d like to see some data that backs up the claim that junk Swiss cheese is exported to the US market successfully.
- phreeza 11mo ago
  I think perhaps what is going on here is that the most commonly exported variety of cheese exported from Switzerland is Emmentaler, which matches the US taste profile (and has holes), but in Switzerland is considered a rather bland variety compared to e.g. Gruyere or Appenzeller. Maybe that got a bit exaggerated and it was labeled as "junk" cheese somewhere along the chain of communication.
- aktuel 11mo ago
  If you believe that price equals quality, the fact that Switzerland is an order of magnitude richer than Peru - and considerably richer than the US - might make all the difference.
deleted 11mo ago
[deleted]
fsckboy 11mo ago
>that they export the junk cheese to the US and keep the good stuff people who produce and sell stuff follow profit maximization. Colombia sells its best coffee on the export market because there it will command the highest prices. The people who live in wine growing regions (agricultural) do not have the disposable income to afford expensive wines, so they are shipped to cities. Great croissants are sold locally because they don't last long being shipped. It's not more than profit maximization.
- baxtr 11mo ago
  What you are describing holds true only if the buyer values the higher quality, which is true for coffee. But if you can send the cheap stuff and get the same price why not do that and keep the high quality items for the local market? Southern Europeans export their tasteless tomatoes to Northern Europe because people there don’t value tasty tomatoes that much. So southern Europeans keep the good vegetables for themselves.
  - mschuster91 11mo ago
    > Southern Europeans export their tasteless tomatoes to Northern Europe because people there don’t value tasty tomatoes that much. So southern Europeans keep the good vegetables for themselves. It's the other way around. The problem is that mass-market tomato varieties have been selected and bred for a long shelf life - which led to them losing taste because breeders didn't care about taste, only about durability [1]. And the flavors aren't the only thing that went away, the second breeding focus on yield led to tomatoes that don't have as much sugar any more because there's only so much sugar a single plant can make. So if you want to ship tomatoes to Nothern European countries that actually last a few days of display time on the shelf before going bad, you'll want to breed varieties with less taste. If you were to ship tasty tomatoes, probably half the shipment would go bad before ever reaching the store. And that's not just valid for tomatoes, it's valid for all sorts of agricultural products - including meat. You're only going to get the truly good stuff if you go local and pay the surcharge for varieties and breeds that are "less efficient" to grow but yield more flavor. [1] https://www.science.org/content/article/why-tomatoes-got-bland-and-how-make-them-sweet-again https://www.science.org/content/article/why-tomatoes-got-bla...
kakacik 11mo ago
I presume you mean Emmental, the term "swiss cheese" doesn't exist or more precisely has no meaning, its like saying "american car" for example, what do you want to discuss with such a vague term. Switzerland produces up to 1000 varieties of cheese (still nothing compared to what France produces but its a tiny country comparatively), and literally 1 semi famous variety has holes. Its not what most Swiss folks buy most of the time, that would be ie well aged AOP Gruyere or Appenzeller for example (much much better taste experience than even best Emmental can ever produce).
- petesergeant 11mo ago
  > the term "swiss cheese" doesn't exist or more precisely has no meaning Would you believe Australians call cheddar "tasty cheese"?
- IAmBroom 11mo ago
  > I presume you mean Emmental, the term "swiss cheese" doesn't exist or more precisely has no meaning, its like saying "american car" for example, what do you want to discuss with such a vague term. Nonsense. Swiss cheese has a particular appearance and taste profile in the US. If you tried to sell something as "Swiss cheese" that was bright yellow and solid, you'd be laughed at.
enopod_ 11mo ago
As a Swiss, I can assure you that this is false. Most cheese varieties have very strict quality requirements, if they're not met, the cheese may only end up as no-name ground cheese for pizza or something like that. But an Emmentaler, Gruyere, or Sbrinz always has the same quality, no matter if it's exported or for domestic consumption.
- matttproud 11mo ago
  As an American living in CH, I say send all of the (bland) Emmentaler to the U.S.; I wouldn't miss it! ;-) Inländervorrang for the rest!
  - linksnapzz 11mo ago
    I am quite fond of Appenzeller; I presume we're getting the good stuff-the price certainly reflects that!
- Xmd5a 11mo ago
  As a Frenchman I disagree, cheese is very sensitive to environmental condition, in particular during transport. To eat a good piece of St Nectaire, first go to to St Nectaire (eat the crust too!)

rootusrootus 11mo ago

Why on Earth would they intentionally export only their garbage cheese? Then the world will only know them for that. The holes in modern Emmental cheese are created intentionally. In Switzerland the additive used to create them is forbidden. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmental_cheese#Natural_holes_in_cheese https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmental_cheese#Natural_holes_...

helicone 11mo ago
because their garbage cheese is still miles better than what other people make, and there's no cheese market large enough and rich enough to pay them what their top cheese is worth, so its worth more just to keep it for themselves
- rootusrootus 11mo ago
  > there's no cheese market large enough and rich enough to pay them what their top cheese is worth That sounds like the market expressing the collective opinion that their cheese is not miles better than what other people make. On a related note, the best seems to be considered Emmentaler AOC, and it does not seem especially difficult to purchase outside of Switzerland.
  - eru 11mo ago
    Emmentaler is a fairly common cheese. I would expect the 'best' to be some obscure cheese that neither you nor me have heard of. I'm quite fond of the Belper Knolle, but even that ain't particularly obscure.
    - JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
      > would expect the 'best' to be some obscure cheese that neither you nor me have heard of …why? Gruyère and Appenzeller are delicious. They’re also well known. My favorite blue in the world is Point Reyes. Controversial when I’m in France. But not some secret undiscovered jewel.
    - rootusrootus 11mo ago
      If obscurity is an important factor, there are going to be as many 'best' cheeses as there are people. For this discussion to make any sense we need something of a consensus opinion, for which Emmentaler gets nominated often enough.
- eru 11mo ago
  > because their garbage cheese is still miles better than what other people make, [...] Some other people, maybe. But not all other people.
JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
> Why on Earth would they intentionally export only their garbage cheese? This usually happens when one population is discerning and the other is not.
- rootusrootus 11mo ago
  I don't know what to make of that statement. It is arrogant, at least. Are you trashing just the 340 million people in the US with this comment, or everybody not-Swiss?
  - JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
    > It is arrogant, at least. Are you trashing just the 340 million people in the US with this comment, or everybody not-Swiss? You’re parsing discernment as a value judgement. Don’t do that. New York City has America’s best bagels. This is because OG bagels are best fresh, and making them fresh multiple times a day takes a lot of work. (They stale super fast because gluten is a bastard. Hence toasting.) To pay for that work at a non-ludicrous cost per bagel, you need lots of reliable demand. That really only happens when you have an ecosystem of people who have been eating bagels all their lives made by folks who have been making them similarly. You don’t find great bagels outside New York (at an affordable price) because the demand isn’t there. Meanwhile, if you haven’t spent time in New York, you probably don’t know (or care about) the difference. Which means you’re unlikely to give excess patronage to anyone who tries to do it right if they try to do it near you. That doesn’t make anyone outside New York who likes their local bagel wrong; it’s just that economies make it very difficult, and frankly pointless, to replicate the New York bagel elsewhere. If the people in your town will pay extra only for great cheese and the guys across the pond will pay the same price for mediocre and great cheeses, the deck is stacked. (And to be clear, you can find great Swiss cheeses in America. What you can’t is great Swiss wines.)
    - rootusrootus 11mo ago
      I'm definitely not on the same wavelength as you this evening. > New York City has America’s best bagels That's a big claim. You say it's because they are best fresh -- are you saying that the rest of the country does not have anybody who makes fresh bagels? That's what I get from your first comment, but then you moved the goalposts a bit by qualifying "at an affordable price." So maybe other cities in the US do have bagels that are just as good as NYC but they are more expensive? I see there is one final qualification you've made: "the New York bagel." In that case, obviously NYC has the best New York bagel ;).
tekno45 11mo ago
so a tourist will go to switzerland love it and hate it once they're home? very good export business
- deleted 11mo ago
  [deleted]
- com2kid 11mo ago
  That's how I felt about eggs after visiting Japan. American eggs are bland and tasteless in comparison. Backyard eggs are a general exception to that rule.
schainks 11mo ago
Same reason why it’s hard to buy a decent Swiss wine: the good stuff makes it into bellies before it gets to the border!
PetitPrince 11mo ago
Different countries have different tastes (Coca Cola has a different syrup mixture for each countries for instance). There's a YouTube video from a franco-japanese guy who interview a Japanese cheese maker. He was trained by a Swiss person (but in the US, of all places) and softly complained that Japanese palate favored more bland cheese compared to what he experienced. So it makes sense for a Swiss cheese maker to export a more marketable cheese, which are generally less strong and younger than the local one. Just like there's an export Guinness or Kilkenny that different from one you'd get in Ireland. Of note: cheese label are strongly protected in Europe; you cannot legally sell an AOP labelled cheese without adhering to strict guideline about the raw material (including geographic provenance) and processing.
- marklubi 11mo ago
  Similar thing with orange juice. The producers add 'flavor packs' to adjust the taste for different regions of the US. My son and I travel all over the US for various competitions, and there are certain regions where he refuses to get OJ because of the flavor differences.
  - MiddleEndian 11mo ago
    I never looked into why, but when I moved from Boston to Seattle, I noticed dairy products (milk, cottage cheese) tasted different in Seattle. Confirmed it again when I moved back to Boston.
    - marklubi 11mo ago
      Haven't noticed that one. Oxidation perhaps, or maybe salt in the air based on the locations? West coast food (particularly oysters) seems to be a little bit more salty/briny.
      - PetitPrince 11mo ago
        What you feed your cattle change how their milk taste; where I live there's a noticeable different between summer (where cows graze on alpine meadows) and winter (hay) milk.
robocat 11mo ago
Modern America doesn't seem to have much of a culture of cheese. I've just visited New Orleans, and the selection of cheese available in supermarkets was extremely limited. I recall the same issue from past visits elsewhere in the US. The fist time I visited I was horrified to see fake Bega cheese. For more choice in New Orleans I would have needed to go to a cheese shop/restaurant chain called the St James Cheese Company (I didn't visit it). I watched someone cooking a hamburger grab a slice of processed cheese (looked like a standard individual plastic packaged slice to me) and place it on top of the burger to melt (admittedly it turned out fine). Oh, and all the milk I found in New Orleans was ultra-pasteurised (abominable taste) - I didn't see any standard/HTST pasteurized milk. Apparently shelflife is more important than taste. For comparison, Supermarket milk is pasteurized here in NZ (not ultra except for longlife tetrapack) and unpasteurized milk is available in Christchurch (not at supermarket, I think in a shop in St Martins or from dairy 30km out of Christchurch). I admit that here in Christchurch for better imported cheeses I need to go to a cheesemonger. At my local supermarket today I didn't buy a yummy local aged gouda (Meyer) because it was USD40/kg : instead I bought 1 double-cream Brie (Mainland), 1 goatsmilk feta (Foodsnob - Bulgarian - cheap on special), and some "smoked flavour" processed cheese slices (Chesdale - plastic but I like it!). For Emmentaler, the supermarket has "Swiss cheese" which isn't great. They have an imported brand from Germany Emborg Emmentaler Swiss Cheese block 200g NZD9.69 (USD12.7/lb) which you wouldn't buy for its flavour.
- PopAlongKid 11mo ago
  >grab a slice of processed cheese (looked like a standard individual plastic packaged slice to me) Kraft makes a plastic wrapped slice that is "cheese food", however they also make an American cheese slice that is actual cheese. I suspect you saw the latter. https://www.kraftheinz.com/kraft-deli-deluxe/products/00021000602605-deli-deluxe-american-cheese-slices https://www.kraftheinz.com/kraft-deli-deluxe/products/000210...
- soulofmischief 11mo ago
  To be fair, Louisiana, for all its talk of culinary tradition, really doesn't have a lot to offer in terms of variety, compared to other states that I have lived in. This state is a backwater shithole that reminds me of a war-torn Eastern European country, even in New Orleans (which to be fair, is quite small) I wouldn't let it be a typical example of the kind of variety you can find in a modern American city.

bryanrasmussen 11mo ago

I have heard that Denmark exports their best pigs and leaves the second best for home. Not sure why that should be any truer than what you heard regarding Switzerland and their strategy, but they seem to represent two differing strategies about how to best profit from strong points, it would be nice to figure if either is the dominant one. Perhaps we can ask Italy what they do with tomatoes and parmigiano.

mattclarkdotnet 11mo ago
In two minds as to your sarcasm level. Anyone who has eaten bacon in Denmark or Raclette in Switzerland or a fresh pasta sauce in Italy could testify that the best stays home
- Maxion 11mo ago
  I am so confused as to why everyone is talking about Switzerland, the country, acting in unison when it comes to exports. That's not really how it works... Some Swiss companies are more export focused, others are more domestically focused. There's no single central agency that goes around the country and grades cheese manufacturers and creameries and forces some to export, and others to sell to local grocery store chains...
  - shermantanktop 11mo ago
    You sure about that? Swiss agriculture is tightly controlled.
- bryanrasmussen 11mo ago
  I heard it from a Dane, but obviously your taste buds have allowed you to take a statistically meaningful sampling, that's pretty lucky. The reason why I might give it some credence is twofold 1. I would suppose travel from point X to point Y might lead to degradation of quality and thus the top quality leaving at X might be passable when arriving at Y. 2. I suppose there are different income levels involved, Danes are pretty parsimonious. I don't think most of them actually care about having the best, they care about having passable quality which is of course much better than a middle class person will have access to in the U.S, but perhaps they export the best and premium because obviously with a world wide market there would be enough really upper-scale rich buyers to make it worthwhile to do so. I have to say I don't really care much, but I think there may be scenarios in which a large portion of the best quality of a nation's produce gets exported (obviously not all of it, but a large portion) and am interested in that as how economics works. As far as anecdotes however, my Italian ex-wife said the best Italian food she ever had was at a fancy restaurant we went to in Prague. I thought it was good but I don't much care past a certain point, so I didn't notice. My favorite was a small restaurant in Vomero that just made the same two dishes all day long and all the workers came to eat there. I like Danish pork, but generally stuff like flæskesteg, which historically was yes, a luxury good, but a luxury good for peasants. So I think probably not the best. Yes definitely anything I have eaten in Danish or Italian dishes in their homeland was better than what I ate in those culinary traditions in the U.S or England, but I doubt that was because I had a great sampling to choose from and could decide what was what based only on my experience.

palata 11mo ago

"Swiss cheese" is not... a "Swiss" cheese. It's just the name of a cheese, but that cheese does not come from Switzerland.

JumpCrisscross 11mo ago
> that cheese does not come from Switzerland The canton of Bern makes an absolutely excellent Emmantaler. It’s the original Swiss cheese as brought to America by 19th-century Swiss immigrants to Wisconsin.
- palata 11mo ago
  Emmentaler is a cheese originally from Switzerland, though many other countries now make a cheese that they call like that. "Swiss cheese" is supposed to be similar to Emmentaler (or inspired from it?). But the fact that Swiss Emmentaler counts as Swiss cheese does not mean that Swiss cheese counts as Emmentaler, or is from Switzerland at all.
- mda 11mo ago
  I always found Emmentaler bland and boring compared to many others in Switzerland, I wish the immigrants brought something better.
  - deleted 11mo ago
    [deleted]

JumpCrisscross 11mo ago

> they told me almost the opposite For Emmantaler? Or cheese in general?

elzbardico 11mo ago

Don’t trust everything people tell you

mymacbook 11mo ago

I don’t think this is true, wherever I’ve traveled the opposite has held - the finest materials are exported which is sad for the locals. Right away Wool stuck out as an example from Peru. I naively thought that going to Peru would guarantee me the finest wool at the best prices. Anyway I’d like to see some data that backs up the claim that junk Swiss cheese is exported to the US market successfully.

phreeza 11mo ago
I think perhaps what is going on here is that the most commonly exported variety of cheese exported from Switzerland is Emmentaler, which matches the US taste profile (and has holes), but in Switzerland is considered a rather bland variety compared to e.g. Gruyere or Appenzeller. Maybe that got a bit exaggerated and it was labeled as "junk" cheese somewhere along the chain of communication.
aktuel 11mo ago
If you believe that price equals quality, the fact that Switzerland is an order of magnitude richer than Peru - and considerably richer than the US - might make all the difference.

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fsckboy 11mo ago

>that they export the junk cheese to the US and keep the good stuff people who produce and sell stuff follow profit maximization. Colombia sells its best coffee on the export market because there it will command the highest prices. The people who live in wine growing regions (agricultural) do not have the disposable income to afford expensive wines, so they are shipped to cities. Great croissants are sold locally because they don't last long being shipped. It's not more than profit maximization.

baxtr 11mo ago
What you are describing holds true only if the buyer values the higher quality, which is true for coffee. But if you can send the cheap stuff and get the same price why not do that and keep the high quality items for the local market? Southern Europeans export their tasteless tomatoes to Northern Europe because people there don’t value tasty tomatoes that much. So southern Europeans keep the good vegetables for themselves.
- mschuster91 11mo ago
  > Southern Europeans export their tasteless tomatoes to Northern Europe because people there don’t value tasty tomatoes that much. So southern Europeans keep the good vegetables for themselves. It's the other way around. The problem is that mass-market tomato varieties have been selected and bred for a long shelf life - which led to them losing taste because breeders didn't care about taste, only about durability [1]. And the flavors aren't the only thing that went away, the second breeding focus on yield led to tomatoes that don't have as much sugar any more because there's only so much sugar a single plant can make. So if you want to ship tomatoes to Nothern European countries that actually last a few days of display time on the shelf before going bad, you'll want to breed varieties with less taste. If you were to ship tasty tomatoes, probably half the shipment would go bad before ever reaching the store. And that's not just valid for tomatoes, it's valid for all sorts of agricultural products - including meat. You're only going to get the truly good stuff if you go local and pay the surcharge for varieties and breeds that are "less efficient" to grow but yield more flavor. [1] https://www.science.org/content/article/why-tomatoes-got-bland-and-how-make-them-sweet-again https://www.science.org/content/article/why-tomatoes-got-bla...

kakacik 11mo ago

I presume you mean Emmental, the term "swiss cheese" doesn't exist or more precisely has no meaning, its like saying "american car" for example, what do you want to discuss with such a vague term. Switzerland produces up to 1000 varieties of cheese (still nothing compared to what France produces but its a tiny country comparatively), and literally 1 semi famous variety has holes. Its not what most Swiss folks buy most of the time, that would be ie well aged AOP Gruyere or Appenzeller for example (much much better taste experience than even best Emmental can ever produce).

petesergeant 11mo ago
> the term "swiss cheese" doesn't exist or more precisely has no meaning Would you believe Australians call cheddar "tasty cheese"?
IAmBroom 11mo ago
> I presume you mean Emmental, the term "swiss cheese" doesn't exist or more precisely has no meaning, its like saying "american car" for example, what do you want to discuss with such a vague term. Nonsense. Swiss cheese has a particular appearance and taste profile in the US. If you tried to sell something as "Swiss cheese" that was bright yellow and solid, you'd be laughed at.

enopod_ 11mo ago

As a Swiss, I can assure you that this is false. Most cheese varieties have very strict quality requirements, if they're not met, the cheese may only end up as no-name ground cheese for pizza or something like that. But an Emmentaler, Gruyere, or Sbrinz always has the same quality, no matter if it's exported or for domestic consumption.

matttproud 11mo ago
As an American living in CH, I say send all of the (bland) Emmentaler to the U.S.; I wouldn't miss it! ;-) Inländervorrang for the rest!
- linksnapzz 11mo ago
  I am quite fond of Appenzeller; I presume we're getting the good stuff-the price certainly reflects that!
Xmd5a 11mo ago
As a Frenchman I disagree, cheese is very sensitive to environmental condition, in particular during transport. To eat a good piece of St Nectaire, first go to to St Nectaire (eat the crust too!)