The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-12-22
ABOUT CHEESE EATERS.
AMERICJNS ARE EARNING THE 1T
 TIE OF LATE.

ed Nearly Seven Million Pounds Last
 Year and Exported Almost Four Nil-
 lion Pounds.
 | The consumption of cheese in this country increases every year out of all proportion with the increase in popuia- ton, and while we have not reached a point where it is such staple article of food as 1t is in many of the European l countries, yet if the taste for it con- tinues to grow as it has in the last two decades it will not be very long before Americans will take rank with Euro peans as cheese eaters. In Europe | cheese is almost as staple as bread. To | the English laborer cheese and ale and to the German workman cheese and beer are as essential as coffee and bread to the American.
 The Workmen of this country are more and more each year realizing the value of good, nourishing Yankee | cheese, and it is growing in favor cor respondingly as an article of food Among the foreign element here, and with their children to the first and sec ond generations, the European cheeses | are in favor, notably those made in | Switzerland.
 It is not, however, among the labor | ing and poorer classes alone that the | consumption of cheese is on the increase i in the United States. There is a grow ing demand for it among the more for tunate classes, With whom certain brands of imported or domestic cheese have come to be considered necessary part of every dinner
 1t is not so very many years ago that cheese was almost entirely ignored upon the bills of fare of the best New | York restaurants, but now it can be found in great variety, and not a few restaurants are known particularly for | the excellent quality and variety oftheir | cheeses. Many dainty and delicious dishes now prepared by the best chefs of the country are garnished with | cheese in way that q few years ago would have been surprising.
 From a detic point of view cheese is excellent for the system, and is Va healthful aid to the proper digestion of a hearty dinner To the epicure cheese is more than this-it is delicious, it is restful and it is the peacemaker be- tween certain antagonistic articles of | diet which form usually a part of every elaborate dinner.
 With the increased home demand for American cheese there has come an in crease in the demand for it abroad, and during the first eight months of 1897 there was exported from this city alone 1 29,246, ,346 pounds of the value of $2,62l,- = 16S. The increase in the export of our cheese has been coincident with a marked increase in our imports of for eign cheeses.
 l Speaking of the increased cOnsump- ton of foreign cheeses in this country, | A. l.. Reynolds of the cheese importing firm of A. l.. & J. J. Reynolds, recog- nized authority on cheeses, said that twenty years ago there was but one | firm in this country which could be said really to be large importers of cheese, while now there are four such firms in New York alone. These four firms. by the way import, it is said, about ninety per cent, of all the foreign cheese brought to the United States.
 The consumption of cheese in this country has reached a point where it is not now an unusual thing for a first class grocery or delicatessen store to carry in stock a dozen different brands of domestic and imported cheeses, while some of them have on sale continually twice that many.
 Among the most popular of the for eign cheeses brought to this country are Swiss, Roquefort. Edam. Limburger, Sap Sago, Camembert, Romano, Cor ganzola, Erie and Cheddar.
 Domestic substitutes for many of these cheeses are made. some of them with such success that it takes a person with a really cultivated taste for cheese to distinguish the difference be- tween the domestic and the genuine inn ported article
 The foreign cheese mostly initiated in this country is the Swiss. A wholesale dealer in cheese speaking of this fea- ture of the American industry said that during last month his firm sold 73, 500 pounds of imported Swiss cheese, and 50,500 pounds of the domestic made | Swiss" cheese.
 We sold the American article for ex- actly what it Was,' he said, but if 1t becomes genuine imported cheese in the hands of the retailer, that's none of our business
 The American-made Swiss cheese re- sembles very closely indeed the genu- inc article, but there is peculiar flavor to the real article, readily distinguisha- ble by good judges of cheese, which the American makers never have been able 10 produce, This flavor, it is said is due to a herb which grows in great quantities in Switzerland, on which the mlk-giving animals feed. Efforts have been made by dairymen to culti- vate the herb in this country, but they have failed. A few years ago, when A. l.. Reynolds was studying the cheese in dustries in Europe, he was being shown over his farm by an old Swiss who had spent a lifetime in the manufacture of | cheese. With them was the son of the old man, who spoke a little English. As the group were passing through a pasture where sheep, goats and cows were grazing. turning to his son and pointing to the herb growing with the grass, the old man said: Tell Herr | Reynolds that is the secret of the suc- cess of our cheese and the reason his good countrymen cannot equal it.''
 An opinion prevails that Swiss cheese is made altogether of goats milk This is not wholly true. While much goats milk is used, sheep and cows milk also are used. It is the custom of the Swiss farmers who have different milk-giving animals to mix their milk in the manu- | Fp ,f oh