Jacqueline Friedrich: The Wine Humanist WINE BY PEOPLE, FOR PEOPLE; WINE FROM THE HEART

As you may know, in one of his last official acts, ex-Pres Bush instituted a 300% tax on Roquefort cheese. Petitions are circulating, asking people to protest Bush’s foolishness by signing a demand/request that Obama rescind the wildly excessive duty. I do sympathize…to a point. I feel our political muscle is better used elsewhere. Here’s the response I sent when I received the petition:




Why I won’t sign the petition.


I agree that Bush’s action was vindictive and that his punitive and vengeful tariff should be rescinded. But I think we should put our passions to work where they’re needed and I truly feel that’s not the case with Roquefort.

First, at least 80% of Roquefort is produced and sold by Societé, a subdivision of Lactalis, the largest producer of cheese in Europe and second only to Danone in the agroalimentaire sector in France. Lactalis processes 22 million liters of milk everyday, turning it into such visible brands as Président, Bridel and Lactel.

I think it is quite capable of doing its own lobbying.

Additionally, very little, if any Roquefort is produced by ancestral methods.
The 'blueing' is almost always provoked by the addition of Penicillium roqueforti during the cheesemaking process, rarely by the ancestral method of mold naturally forming on rye bread. And the cheeses are matured in such a way that they can be put on a market in a much shorter time than if made by strictly traditional methods. And then there's the uniformity of flavor brought about by the EU's emphasis on American-style hygiene.

The USA accounts for only 2% of Roquefort exports. What’s perhaps more crucial to the well-being of the farmers who raise the sheep and produce the milk purchased by companies like Lactalis is that the current output of ewe’s milk in the authorized Roquefort zone exceeds the needs of the dairies producing Roquefort.
They use the surplus to make products like French “Feta” like Lactalis’s Salakis and they pay the farmers much less per liter for milk so used than they do for milk used for Roquefort. My hunch is that that commercial practice is more hurtful to the small farmer than Bush’s stupid tariff.

I’ve been actively defending, promoting, explaining and writing about artisanal foods and wines for the past 25 years. Such products need protection. It’s too easy to make McDonald’s the poster child of he malbouffe. But the malbouffe starts right here in France where, for example, most cheeses are pasteurized – and that without any pressure from the United States. My Leclerc in Chinon displays -- I’m guessing -- 20 or more different “Camemberts” including several "lite" versions. Only one – ONE – is made with raw milk and by the ancestral method of being ladled by hand into its mold, or moulé a la louche.

Faced with increasingly Draconian hygiene requirements by the European Union combined with price-cutting demands by hypermarchés as well as the ‘dumbing down’ of tastebuds, as consumers – including the French – begin to fear flavorful, gorgeously stinky cheeses – and other characterful foods – many wonderful products are in danger.

I would energetically support any group or action that wanted to protect the authentic, time-honored foodways of France. But 99% of Roquefort, IMHO, does not fit that description.