Who cut the cheese?

Have you ever wondered how cheese came to be? How the ancient art of cheesemaking was mastered and how there came to be so many different types of cheese? Will myth has it that nomadic tribes in Central Asia first discovered the cheesy concoction while they traveled around the continent. They carreid milk in their saddlebags, and without the knowledge that we have nowadays, the milk eventually began to curdle within the saddlebags. Since the saddlebags were made of animal skin, enzymes and the cheese-hardening agent known as rennin were introduced to the milk, also speeding up the curdling process. The galloping of the horses acted as a churn, and separated the curds from the whey. The result of all this travel was a new refreshing whey drink, and the formation of cheese in its most natural, high-protein state. The art of cheesemaking then made its way from Central Asia over to Rome.

The Romans were the first known civilization to master the art of cheesemaking. They were the first to introduce the concept of aging and ripening the cheese, which caused many distinct flavor changes amongst the cheese. The Romans enjoyed several different types of cheese because of this realization. Smoking the cheese was also invented by the Romans, and it is thanks to them that we have all those delicious wood-burned flavors of cheese nowadays.

The cheese industry has risen incredibly in the past few decades, with production of cheese being over 6 billion pounds in the 21st century. More than one third of all the milk produced in the world is used to make cheese, a staggering amount. The average American eats around 31 pounds of cheese per year, mozarella being the most popular of the cheeses, closely followed by cheddar and processed American cheeses. 300 different types of cheese are currently available to the general public in America, although there are actually hundreds of different types of cheese throughout the world. Here are just a few types of cheese:

Gruyere: A hard, yellow, Swiss cheese.
Havarti: Semi-soft Danish cheese
Gouda: Yellow, Dutch cheese made from cow’s milk
Camembert: Soft, creamy French cheese
Brie: Soft, French cheese made from cow’s milk
Provolone: Italian, whole milk cheese
Mozarella: several types of cheeses that are made by spinning and cutting; Italian
Cheddar: Hard, yellow to off-white British cheese