I will see if they are selling again next week.

I have seen neither hide nor hair of it this "Cathedral City" of which you speak. And whereas typically I only look for it with a quick pass, I looked hard this past week. I've only been able to find Cheddar in Germany, and it's very easy to find there.

I have found cathedral city in Swiss coops where there is typically an international community and poss tourists, for example Luzern, Basel. Also there are a few French supermarkets near the borders that stock cheddar not necessarily cathedral city e.g Leclerc and Carrefour.

Basel, Zurich and even Waedenswil Coops have it. It's in a red-and-brown bag, in the "cheeses from other countries" section.

The USA does have a number of really good cheeses, just as they also have a number of really good beers. But neither of those you are likely to find in any mainstream supermarkets over there, and I guess many Americans are fully unaware of their existence.

So not too different to the situation here really.

What a shame Cheddar didn't get its act together early to get an AOC. Most of the cheddar found in supermarkets around the world just does not deserve to come even close to the name. A disgrace.

AOC in English is PDO (Protected Designation of Origin) and there is one for "West Country Farmhouse Cheddar"... it's too late to try to protect the name Cheddar now as it really describes a cheese made with the cheddaring process. There is also a Slow Food Presidium for Somerset Artisan Cheddar, and the criteria for this is so strict that only 3 farms qualify.

Too many vested interests in this now. If major players in the food industry (no, Greggs doesn't count) were making big bucks from Cornish pasties, they'd never have succeeded in getting PGI status.

I was in what seemed to be a pretty good cheese shop in NYC last October and found some "genuine" Gruyère.


Made in Langnau

Has it though?

Go to your average Tescos or Sainsbury's and look for British cheeses in the cheese section and as likely as not you will find industrially produced garbage atuned to the taste buds of the lowest common denominator and which represents a total insult to the variety and quality of true British cheeses. Why? Simply because the supply chain mechanisms of large supermarkets prefer to deal with industrial-scale suppliers. Small and local dairies who furthermore may have greater variance in their quality and ability to deliver have difficulty getting their foot in the door, no matter how much better their cheese tastes.

Not wanting to move the debate in a different direction but a PDO wouldn't protect cheddar (or indeed any other cheese) from inferior american cheddars as the PDO is purely an EU device... hence why the Aussies can create australian champagne.

and Austalian "parmesan"
and Australian "camembert"
and Australian "port"
...

Isn't Parmesan now a DOC, which is why they came up with the name "Grande Padano". A bit like "Danish Blue" used to Roquefort.

indeed but the protection afforded is only within the EU

The US have indeed some really good Cheddar. Its just like you say Switzerland has no good beer when you only know Feldschloesschen. I lived for quite a while near Chicago which also means near Wisconsin. I found a lot of really good cheeses from up north at the local farmer market. Very delicious and tasty stuff you could not find at the normal supermarket. It is much easier to find one the very specially good micro brews there. However, a really good supermarket is Whole Foods (Beer and Cheese wise). Having the Swiss big three, Emmentaler, Gruyere and Appenzeller, I could also find Vacherin, Gomser, Ybrig, and Zigger there.

"Grana Padano" is also a DOC (simply "grana" or "Italian hard cheese" isn't). And "champagne" is. And "Feta" is. And of course "Parmigiano Reggiano" is, including "local" English/German/French spelling such as "parmesan".

But Australia doesn't care (and in any case, it would be bloody difficult to import the real stuff anyway thanks to quarantine laws):
from your friendly neighbourhood Coles, Australian parmesan (won "Best parmesan" at the World Cheese Championship in Wisconsin ), Australian Feta Greek or Danish (to rub it in...), and until recently Australian champagne

Sorry, Tom, but nothing can beat farmhouse Lancashire and a glass of Nyetimber - also an award winning English 'champagne'

http://www.decanter.com/news/wine-ne...ng-competition

My comment was sarcasm directed, at Australia for flouting the parmigiano DOC rules, and at parading imitated products at the "World Cheese Championship".

Near Yverdon there is a lovely wine making village called, for 100s of years and way before any AOC existed, Champagne. They have never ever tried to make champagne- and yet they are not even allowed to put Champagne as the village of production on the bottles. At the same time the French produce industrially made Emmenthal which has the taste and texture of rubber boots- and get away with it.

I was introduced to one of my favorite Swiss cheeses, Etivaz, in the US of all places. (Zingerman's Deli in Ann Arbor, for any Michiganders out there...)

I was all excited when we moved here, dreaming of a ready supply. Unfortunately I can't buy Etivaz in the Coop, nor in any of the 'proper' cheese shops in my area. I can also buy an interesting cheese from Hoch Ybrig at Zingerman's - but can't find that here either, even though Hoch Ybrig is just 20 minutes down the road.

Such are the forces of market demand.

---

I'll be the first to condemn the rubbery orange or yellow petrochemical product passing for cheese in big supermarkets - the stuff is despicable. But don't write off the American palate all together. Good cheese, from all over the world, is sold and very much appreciated all over the US.

Good cheese costs more than the 99 cents/lb that the rubber stuff does, however - which is why you don't find it on a Dominoes Pizza, or Subway sandwiches, or in the pre-packaged section of a supermarket. The rubber stuff meets a certain demand, the 'good' stuff another market entirely.

Oh and by the way, many American artisanal cheeses rival those I've tasted anywhere else in the world. But again, these serve a different market