Alpine Cheeses

Alpine-Style Cheeses are among the most elegant of cheese styles. Many of the iconic and beloved cheeses of Switzerland, France and areas surrounding the Alps, fall into this category: Comte, Gruyere, Emmentaler, Appenzeller, Raclette. Many are made using traditional methods practiced for hundreds of years, some more than a thousand years. Today those traditions are protected by the EU using PDO regulations.

The European Union Protected Designation of Origin replaces the regulations established by several European countries including France, Spain, Italy, and Greece. While somewhat academic for the less scientific mind, this article at ScienceDirect covers a lot of interesting territory regarding the PDO scheme in general and how it pertains to cheese. DOOR website has a complete, up-to-date list of all PDO foods (and cheeses, of course).

Back to Alpine-style cheeses…

In 1914, WWI caused a slump in cheese sales and a decrease in available hay and fodder. The Swiss Cheese Union was formed. Simply, it was a cartel fueled by greed. The result of forming the cartel stopped competition among Swiss Cheesemakers. The cartel told the Cheesemakers how many wheels they could produce and set the prices for the wheels. To add insult to injury, while there were more than 1000 different cheeses being made in Switzerland at the time, the cartel only supported 7. The 2 biggest were Gruyere and Emmentaler. To bolster the sales of these 2 cheeses in the US, the cartel created Fondue. For more information on the “Fondue Conspiracy” check out this NPR Program from 2014. What a racket.

The cartel stifled the creativity of Swiss Cheesemakers; there was no incentive to create new cheeses; there was no market.

In 1999 this all changed when the cartel was dissolved. Swiss Cheesemakers were free to create and they have done so with a vengeance. With the help of cheese experts such as Caroline Hostettler and her Adopt-an-Alp program, smaller cheesemakers have the opportunity to create  and the consumer has the opportunity to discover and savor some of the finest cheeses made in the Alpes. The Adopt-an-Alp motto is “Support the transhumance movement in the Swiss Alps and get rewarded with the best artisanal cheeses in the world!” While there are too many to discuss, one of my favorite “new” Alpine-style cheeses is Alp Blossom.

What is an  Alpine-Style Cheese?

• Cheeses made using a traditional, specific recipe that includes a heating of the curds following the separation of the curd

  

  and whey.

• Cheeses made from cows that participate in transhumance. “Transhumance is a type of pastoralism or nomadism, a seasonal movement of livestock between fixed summer and winter pastures. In montane regions, it implies movement between higher pastures in summer and lower valleys in winter. Herders have a permanent home, typically in valleys.”*
• Cheeses made in the Alps regions of Europe, primarily Switzerland and the surrounding countries of France, Austria, Italy and Germany.

In 2019, I had the honor of being a guest of Comte AOP for their summer press tour. We spent 5 days in the Jura region of France visiting Comte cooperative farmers, cheesemakers and affineurs who create the most popular cheese in France. The last day of our tour we spent in the Alpine meadows of Comte farmers, Anaël and Quentin Michaud. We met at their farm in Reculfoz. They proudly guided us on a tour their new state-of-art farm, which they were able to build with help from an EU program. The program provides financial aid to young people who choose to stay on the farm rather than moving to the city. The program helps keep alive the traditions of EU rural regions, including the components of cheesemaking. After the tour, we followed them for several miles up to the Alpage, their mountain pastures, where their herd of Montbeliarde and French Simmental, the two breeds of cattle allowed to provide milk for Comte AOP, spent the summer dining on the Alpine meadows flora. TaDa… transhumance.

For more on my Comte 2019 tour, check out this page. Also, if interested in the PDO regulations for Comte AOP, click here.

There are also a number of videos from the tour on my YouTube Channel.

For those of you sitting for the ACS CCP Exam, it’s a safe bet that the terms “Transhumance” and “Alpage” may be on the exam.

(And in keeping with the way the US tends to taint the traditional cheeses of Europe, the term “Swiss Cheese” was coined for marketing purposes to refer to a style of cheeses with holes.)

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumance

Next up Washed Rind Cheeses.

In addition to being a member of the Internationale Guilde des Fromagers (Jura and Garde) and an American Cheese Society Certified Cheese Professional, I am a Certified ServSafe Food Production Manager with certifications that also include ServSafe Certified Instructor and Proctor. I am available for cheese events, cheese program development, cheese training, food safety training and 3rd party food safety auditing. See my About Me and Resume pages for more details or call me at 360 921 9908 to discuss availability.

This post may contain affiliate links from which I receive a small commission from any purchases you make through those links. I thank you for patronizing my amazon influencer store front. 

Cheese events at Sweet Combs of Honey will begin again in the next several weeks. Enjoy your summer vacation!!

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