Althouse: That grated Parmesan cheese might be mostly or nothing but wood.

February 17, 2016

That grated Parmesan cheese might be mostly or nothing but wood.

"Some grated Parmesan suppliers have been mislabeling products by filling them with too much cellulose, a common anti-clumping agent made from wood pulp, or using cheaper cheddar, instead of real Romano. Someone had to pay. Castle President Michelle Myrter is scheduled to plead guilty this month to criminal charges. She faces up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine...."

23 comments:

David said...: Hey, a female CEO. Progress!; 2/17/16, 6:55 AM
rhhardin said...: Fresh Horizons bread in the 80s was made of wood pulp. You could make a cheese sandwich.; 2/17/16, 6:57 AM
Bill R said...: That explains a lot.; 2/17/16, 7:26 AM
traditionalguy said...: Termites favorite brand.; 2/17/16, 7:31 AM
Etienne said...: Fiber is good for your colon. No leaky bowels.

In survival school they teach you to use charcoal (dark or light) to regulate your bowels. Just mix it with water and drink.; 2/17/16, 7:36 AM
CStanley said...: That headline isn't suported by the article. Mostly what they cite is the use of other (cheaper) cheeses in products that claim to be Parmesan, and most of the products contain a much smaller percentage of cellulose (a wood product.) There's no allegation of any product that's anywhere close to 100% wood.; 2/17/16, 7:49 AM
Jaq said...: This does explain some things...; 2/17/16, 7:52 AM
Jaq said...: Ha! Bill R, I didn't see your comment, but I agree!; 2/17/16, 7:53 AM
Paco Wové said...: I guess this one falls into the "I thought everyone already knew that" category. Seriously, people, there's a good reason to grate your own.; 2/17/16, 8:00 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Is the cellulose harmful? No.

So why should the government care? If you like the quality of the product ( both flavor and lack of clumping ) and think it is worth the price, then buy it. If not, don't.

Okay, at some point ( >50%? ) it constitutes fraud, but so freakin' what? If you don't like the flavor, don't buy it again. How much has that fraud cost you, vs. how much is it costing you for the government to go after that level of fraud?

If the government has nothing more important to do than go after this sort of thing then there are an awful lot of departments that need to be cut.; 2/17/16, 8:09 AM
Mary Beth said...: I want to know more about the guy fired for designing "flawed recipes".; 2/17/16, 8:40 AM
MadisonMan said...: Buy your own hunk of cheese and grate it yourself. Problem solved.

When you are buying convenience, sometimes you don't get what you think.; 2/17/16, 9:16 AM
traditionalguy said...: We just want to know if it will catch fire.; 2/17/16, 9:27 AM
Fernandinande said...: I'd rather eat wood pulp than Parmesan cheese.; 2/17/16, 10:32 AM
Rusty said...: I knew my grated parmesan tasted funny.
Turns out it was made from Italian clowns.; 2/17/16, 10:46 AM
robother said...: They should've just marketed it as "gluten free" Parmesan.; 2/17/16, 10:55 AM
Fabi said...: Hold on! Are they suggesting that the cheese in those plastic shakers at Walmart for two bucks is not 100% genuine Parmigiano-Reggiano? I'm losing my faith in capitalism.; 2/17/16, 11:02 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Bryson, Bill (2010-10-05). At Home: A Short History of Private Life (pp. 69-70). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition. "

"It wasn’t always that foreign substances were introduced with the intention of bulking things up. Sometimes they just fell in. A parliamentary investigation of bakeries in 1862 found many of them filled “with masses of cobwebs, weighed down with flour dust that had accumulated upon them, and hanging in strips” ready to drop into any passing pot or tray. Insects and vermin scurried along walls and countertops. A sample of ice cream sold in London in 1881 was found to contain human hair, cat hair, insects, cotton fibers, and several other insalubrious constituents, but this probably reflected a lack of hygiene rather than the fraudulent addition of bulking agents. In the same period, a London confectioner was fined “for colouring his sweets yellow with surplus pigment left over from painting his cart.” However, the very fact that these matters attracted the attention of newspapers indicates they were exceptional events rather than routine ones.

"Humphry Clinker, a sprawling novel written in the form of a series of letters, paints such a vivid picture of life in eighteenth-century England that it is much quoted even now and almost certainly therefore has a lot to answer for. In one of its more colorful passages Smollett describes how milk was carried through the streets of London in open pails, into which plopped “spittle, snot and tobacco-quids from foot passengers, over-flowings from mud-carts, spatterings from coach-wheels, dirt and trash chucked into it by roguish boys for the joke’s-sake, the spewings of infants … and, finally, the vermin that drops from the rags of the nasty drab that vends this precious mixture.” What is easily overlooked is that the book was intended as satire, not as documentary. Smollett wasn’t even in England when he wrote it; he was slowly dying in Italy. (He died three months after its publication.)"; 2/17/16, 11:07 AM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: It's all natural, brah, what's the problem? Do you, like, hate trees or something, man?; 2/17/16, 11:14 AM
Curious George said...: I'm a plant based whole food guy. So I don't have to worry about this stuff.; 2/17/16, 11:17 AM
Curious George said...: It's the cheese that'll kill you.; 2/17/16, 11:17 AM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Ann Alhouse quoted...What is easily overlooked is that the book was intended as satire, not as documentary."

Sure, and socialist Upton Sinclair didn't intend to write a documentary in The Jungle (nor was it), but good luck convincing folks of that now (or, you know, then).; 2/17/16, 11:18 AM
Joe said...: It still smells like vomit.

(Really; it's the isovaleric and butyric acids.); 2/17/16, 10:19 PM