History of cheese

Cheesemaking dates back 5,000 years. It is believed to have originated from warm central Asia and the Middle East, as people learned to preserve naturally curdled milk by draining off the watery whey and salting the concentrated curds. There is physical evidence of cheesemaking in Egyptian pots dating to 2300 BCE.

Eventually, the custom moved West and North into Europe. In those cooler regions, people produced many variations of curds that resulted from milder treatments and time. The cheese became alive with different microorganisms. The ancient Columella notes cheese making practices in Europe in his Rei rusticae ("On Rustic Matters") about 65 CE. By the Middle Ages, cheesemaking techniques developed independently in the large feudal estates and monasteries. They suited local conditions and markets. Small, soft cheeses were mostly eaten locally. Large hard cheeses required milk from many animals so cooperatives developed. Gruyère fruiteries began around 1200 CE. Hard cheese was transported long distances and kept indefinitely. The independent producers resulted in a wide variety of cheese. By the 18th century, cheese was considered a stape food, "white meat" for the poor and an integral course in a multicourse feasts for the rich. The golden age of cheese was probably in the late 19th century to the early 20th century when the art was fully matured and railroad transportation made cheese widely available still at its best.
Sadly, industrialization and war brought the demise of traditional cheesemaking. Cheese and butter factories were born in the US, a country with no cheesemaking tradition. By the end of the Civil War there were hundreds of "associated dairies" that manufactured cheese for many farms. Pharmacies, and later pharmaceutical companies, began mass-producing rennet. At the turn of the century, scientists in Denmark, the US, and France standarized cheese making by introducing pure microbial cultures for curdling and ripening cheese. Cheesemaking no longer benefited from the complex flora found in individual farms. According to Harold McGee, in On Food and Cooking, "the crowning blow to cheese diversity and quality was World War II" (p. 54). Dairying in continental Europe was devastated. In the prolongued recovery, factory production of cheese was favored for its economies of scale and regulation. Cheese became inexpensive and standarized. Since then, most of the cheese in Europe and the US is factory made. In 1973, France instituted a certification program for cheese made by traditional methods. Still, less than 20% of French cheese today qualifies for that certification. In the US, most of the market is flooded with factory "process" cheese, made from a mixture of aged and fresh cheeses blended with emulsifiers and repasteurized. "Natural" cheese, though still almost exclusively factory-made, is not as widely consumed.

In the 21st century, cheese consumption is at its highest world wide. However, it has become an industrial product with little resemblance to the age-old art. McGee expresses that "industrial cheese is...a simplified food that could be and is made anywhere, and that tastes of nowhere in particular" (On Food and Cooking, p.54).

In the recent years, there has been a revival of tradition and quality. In the US, artisan cheese is starting to claim a small portion of the market share. What once was considered white meat for the poor, now is a pricey treat for the urban middle class.

History of bread

There is no other food as important in the history of humanity as is bread. As Harold McGee expresses in his book, On Food and Cooking, bread took the center stage of life early on as it was "a startling sign of the natural's world hidden potential for being transformed, and [man’s] own ability to shape natural materials to human desires."

Bread and bread-making lore infiltrated language and culture early on. Words such as "Lord" come from the Anglo-Saxon hlaford, which means "loaf ward" or the master who supplies food. The word "Lady" derives its meaning from “loaf kneader.” Even the word "companion" can trace its meaning to “one who shares bread.”

The development of bread in pre-historic times is thought to have come about in two ways: First, by cooking pastes of crushed grain and water to form flatbreads; and second, from setting the paste aside, allowing it to ferment, and baking it in an enclosed oven to form raised breads.

Examples of wheat flatbreads include Middle Eastern lavash, Greek pita, Indian roti and chapatti. Latin American tortilla and North American johnnycake are flatbreads made from maize.

The history of wheat bread dates to 8000 BCE. The earliest record of leaven bread comes from the Egyptians, around 4000 BCE. Yeast production, though not entirely understood, was a notable skill. By 300 BCE, it had become a specialized profession in Ancient Egypt.

The Greeks mark on bread was one of whiteness. The early Greeks developed ways to partly refine grain in a way that it produced white bread. The Romans treasured wheat bread enough that wheat was imported from Africa to satisfy the demand of the Empire.

The 17th century brought improvements in milling and in per capita income that led to a wide availability of whiter bread and the dissolution of the brown guild. The Renaissance gave birth to pastries.

In the 1800s, most bread was still baked in communal ovens. The Industrial Revolution led to bakeries, and adulterated flour with whiteners (alum) and fillers (chalk, ground animal bones). Such developments led to the decline of domestic baking.

Furthermore, some innovations came to leaving. Pearlash, a precursor to baking soda and baking powders, appeared around 1790s. Baking powder and baking soda appeared 1830-1850s. Their development increased the ability to leaven doughs that yeast could not, such as fluid cake batters and sweet cookie doughs.

Twentieth century industrialization and modernization led to a decline in the per capita consumption of bread. As incomes rose, more people had ability to eat meat, and high-fat, high-sugar pastries and cakes. Bread was no longer the staff of life. Bread making became more industrialized in that most bread was made in large central factories, not local bakeries. The result was affordable, white bread with uncharacteristic flavor.  

Europeans and North Americans began to eat more bread in the 1980s. Traditional bread making returned. Small bakeries began to produce bread with less refined grain, building flavor with long, slow fermentation, and baking small batches in brick ovens that produced small, dark loaves. The Japanese invented the home bread machine. Today, small fraction of bread is artisan. But manufacturers have started to ship partly baked and frozen loaves to supermarkets. These loaves are rebaked locally and sold while still crusty and flavorful. Currently, we are experiencing a return to flavor and texture characteristic of traditional bread.