Parmesan cheese is made by Punjabi Sikhs – 60,000 of whom live in the Po Valley
Published:
July 24, 2014 at 5:30pm
And what a lot we still have to learn in Malta about this sort of thing. A reader posted a link to this video in the ‘Maltese and Italian food are the best in the world’ debate going on beneath another post. I thought it needed wider attention because it’s so interesting.
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It’s not just Parmesan. A friend of mine has a large farm and creamery in Bergamo, making Taleggio and other dairy products. For the last 20 years at least he has employed only Indians.
Last year I visited some dairy farms in Ragusa and, again, almost all salaried workers are Indian.
Yes, and a lot of clothing and shoes are made in the sweatshops of Prato by virtual slaves from China.
That Parmesan or anything else for that matter is made by non-indigenous Italians does not worry me the slightest – so long as it is of the same or superior quality, and of course that all labour laws are abided by.
[Daphne – God, this is exhausting. Why should it worry you that Parmesan cheese is made by Sikhs? That was neither the point of the video nor the point of my uploading it here. The point is that the specialists are not necessarily who we think they are. Sikhs are not employed in the Italian dairy/cattle trade as slave labour – do those people in the video look hard pressed to you? – but as cattle and dairy SPECIALISTS. That’s why they are Punjabi Sikhs, from a cattle and dairy culture, and not Chinese labourers from a non-dairy culture. Please read a little about the significance of dairy/milkin Sikh culture.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news-feed/chunk-ht-ui-punjabsectionpage-dontmiss/the-sikh-stamp-on-italian-cheese/article1-1085160.aspx
http://www.helladelicious.com/diy/2011/10/sikh-dairymen-behind-italys-famous-parmigiano-reggiano/
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/08/world/europe/08iht-italy08.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/27104/indian-dairy-farmers
Prato results the perfect example of how not to let Chinese ‘entrepreneurs’ colonise a cluster.
The lessons learnt taken to Puglia where the same thing was about to happen to the cluster built around Natuzzi.
It’s all about integration, something the Chinese tend to avoid.
Milan banned the use of handcarts to carry goods around its Chinatown, the real intention being that of restricting exploitation and expose those who break the rules.
To be honest I did not watch the video. I believe I did mention that it did not bother me who made the cheese, or am I dreaming?
It is just that with your anti-Italian bias I initially assumed you were using this as some kind of justification for deprecating Italian food.
Mea culpa. My apologies.
[Daphne – I do not have an anti-Italian bias. I am realistic about the subject. Given that many Maltese are reverential about Italy and Italian culture, this is interpreted as ‘anti-Italian’. If I am anti- anything, it is anti those Maltese who can’t see straight where Italy is concerned. Almost anything in Italy – clothes, style, design, architecture, geographical landscape, music, art, creativity, way of life, ambience – is beaten somewhere else, nowadays even the food. This is not an ‘anti-Italian’ statement, but a realistic one. The Maltese reverence bothers me because it is so closed-minded. The fact that the Tuscan hills are the most beautiful landscape a Maltese person has ever seen does not mean this is the most beautiful landscape anywhere.]
It is hard to look beyond your bias, maybe it is the result of over-compensating for that rather fake pro-Italian bias in Malta. In that respect I understand you. I for one lived in Italy and must admit that whilst there are things I detest about certain aspects of its culture, there are others I deeply admire.
A recent and excellent book on the history of food and cuisines:
http://www.bookdepository.com/Cumin-Camels-Caravans-Gary-Paul-Nabhan/9780520267206
[Daphne – Thank you. I bought it immediately.]
Not a very good promotion for Parmesan cheese.
I hope they make them shower before coming in contact with the cheese.
Some of them have this continuous smell of curry.at least the ones I know.
[Daphne – Well, Mr Loporto, you cannot get on a public bus in the summer without being knocked out by the body odour of Maltese people who have yet to discover anti-perspirant in 2014 and who believe that the polyester shirts they wear can be hung up at night and put on again the following morning. At least they have now discovered toothpaste and shampoo, which wasn’t necessarily the case before I began driving in 1982 and had to take the bus everywhere. That was how I developed the skill of holding my breath for increasingly long periods.]
You are right.
But fortunately we don’t have to eat their cheese.
Actually that’s why I keep off Gozo gbejniet.
If you were to ride on one of their buses, you can tell you are in the land of Gozo cheeselets.
Poplu tal-bigilla
Silvio, have you ever considered writing a book? Putting down your memoirs and maybe making some money from regaling the public at large, with your wide-ranging intellect, enthralling wit and repartee?
Actually I did, and still do.
The only problem that keeps me back is finding enough readers to appreciate its beauty.
I am even considering asking Mrs Caruana Galizia to promote it on her blog.
I really hope you will make it a point of acquiring a copy.
I did work with a Sikh many years ago, Kal was his name but he went by Karl but I called him Carlo and he did have a very noticeable body odour problem, but not at the start of the work day.
But that was not because has a Sikh, although he was clean shaven and he did not wear a turban, but it was because he worked physically hard and sweated a lot throughout the day.
Carlo was a quiet and reserved family man of few words but he did have a clever sense of humour on rare occasions, which I appreciated.
Gbejniet tal-karri
Parmesan is not Parmigiano Reggiano. It is an inferior cheese inspired by Parmigiano used mainly as a grating cheese.
[Daphne – With the patience of a Sikh, I shall respond. Parmesan cheese is Parmiggiano Reggiano. When speaking English, you say Parmesan cheese and not Parmiggiano Reggiano. The cheese you are thinking of is Grana Padano. This is not an inferior form of Parmiggiano Reggiano, but a different cheese altogether: http://www.granapadano.com/aspx/Home.aspx?idAmb=103&idMenu=-1&liv=0 Parmiggiano Reggiano, too, is grated over food. That is mainly how it is eaten, despite the misconception from weddings and receptions that it is served as a wheel from which people dig out chunks. This is the way to eat Parmiggiano Reggiano in Italy and anywhere else that people know anything about food: you buy a chunk by weight and grate it over soups, pasta dishes and risottos.]
I think you’re thinking about the cheap grated cheese. Kefalotiri, I think it’s called.
[Daphne – That’s not a cheap grated cheese, though. That’s the Greek cheese. Completely different taste and texture and way too salty for use in lieu of Parmesan. No, I think he’s thinking of those packets of finely grated ‘Parmesan’ they used to sell at the grocer’s in the even darker ages of Maltese food, when you bought a packet of Knorr soup powder with those padded cartoon figures attached and a packet of powdery ‘Parmesan’ and served the one with the other.]
No memory of the Knorr soup or the cartoon figures, thankfully. None. Thank God for small mercies. They still sell those bags of cheese though.
[Daphne – That was in the early 1970s, the heyday of powdered chemicals to which you added water and called it food. It was thought space-age, the stuff of the future. You added water to brown powder and called it soup, water to white powder and called it mashed potato, water to yellow powder and called it custard, water to green powder and called it jelly, water to pink powder and called it blancmange, water to electric orange powder and called it orange squash, and so on. No wonder people of my generation are going down like skittles with cancer. Must be that fantastic Mediterranean diet we all ate. I remember watching this Panorama documentary on television when I was around eight or nine, describing how powdered food and nutrients in pill form were the food of the future, that we would all eat like astronauts (the big heroes back then) while wearing our metallic space suits. With Mr Mash we would conquer the world and live for ever.]
I actually went to a barbecue once where packet mashed potatoes were served. The hosts were young graduates, with good jobs. You’d never get that from an educated person in the UK. Even students who have limited budgets veer away from these things. In the UK, I always feel it’s a lack of education, awareness and money that makes people buy rubbish. In Malta, it’s “qamel” half the time.
[Daphne – And laziness. Why scrub potatoes, boil them and mash them with butter you have remember to soften and milk that you have remembered to bring out of the fridge (and buy) when you can just add hot water to powder and stir? But it’s also total indifference to what you’re eating.]
It’s the same with clothes, home furnishings, music, cinema, social gatherings, anything. Good taste – in anything, but literally, in food – requires a delicacy of feeling which is congenitally absent in the Maltese.
It’s cultural, and genetic. Yes, my dears, genetic. Because if the same culture inhabits the same few square miles and procreates with itself for generations, in the end the delineation is genetic as well as cultural.
Did you say EU? Yes, right. We cheated our way in so we could get money. That’s about it.
I mix in some Colman’s mustard powder to the mashed potato concoction described. It gives it a bit of zing.
Daphne, you have the patience of Job.
I really admire you.
Maybe it is because I am so old but I cannot tolerate idiots.
With the patience of a Sikh I assure you that Parmesan is not Parmegiano Reggiano and I am not thinking of Grana Padano, which like Parmigiano is graded by a consortio. Neither one, nor the other is Parmesan.
[Daphne – There will come a time when I shall tell you all to go to hell and stay there. But until then, I will valiantly do my bit in the cause of the greater knowledge of food:
http://www.food.com/library/parmesan-cheese-467
http://www.cheese.com/parmesan/
http://cheese.about.com/od/cheesebasics/f/parm_parmigiano.htm ]
The Shadow typifies “he who has ears but does not hear.” He probably has eyes too but does not see. Unfortunately, there are many like The Shadow in Malta who refuse to learn but insist on pontificating on everything they know nothing about.
Lambs to the slaughter, jahasra.
I have been dealing in D.O.P. cheese (importing/exporting/buying/selling) on a European level for 23 years.
I do not consider myself an expert, but I do know the basics.
Technically, the difference between Parmesan and Parmigiano-Reggiano is that cheese can only be called Parmigiano-Reggiano if it is produced under a specific set of standards in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy.
Cheese produced in a similar manner to Parmigiano-Reggiano in the U.S. is called Parmesan and is often used as a substitute. However, since Parmesan is produced in a different region and under less stringent guidelines, it has a different flavor, texture and price.
[Daphne – The US has nothing to do with it. This is Europe, where Parmesan is Parmigiano Reggiano and both names, the English name and the Italian name, are controlled. Parmesan cheese in Europe has to be Parmigiano Reggiano. In fact, even if there were no controls, it would still be: Europeans don’t eat US substitutes for European cheese, no more than they eat ‘bologna’ US substitute for salami. Open any good English cookbook, and if a recipe calls for Parmigiano Reggiano, it is listed in the ingredients as ‘Parmesan cheese’ or simply as ‘Parmesan’.]
One difference between Parmigiano-Reggiano and Parmesan is the way in which the cows producing the milk used in the cheese are raised. In accordance with the strict guidelines for Parmigiano-Reggiano, only the milk of cows that graze on grass and hay is used.
Parmesan cheese, in contrast, is often made using pasteurized milk from cows that are generally fed a diet of concentrated feed, not grass-fed cows. This contributes greatly to the difference in taste between the two cheeses.
Only raw milk, natural whey cultures, calf rennet and salt are allowed in Parmigiano-Reggiano and cheese makers use the whey from the previous day’s cheese making. Parmesan makers often purchase starters from enzyme manufacturers and different brands of Parmesan often use different starters. Since different starters create different flavors, there’s a lack of consistency from brand to brand. Also, Parmesan generally has a higher salt content, and allows the inclusion of additional ingredients, such as cellulose powder and potassium sorbate.
[Daphne – The rules do not govern any such difference between ‘Parmigiano Reggiano and ‘Parmesan’. The word ‘Parmesan’ does not exist in Italy; it is an English word. Again you are thinking of the US, which just doesn’t enter the equation here. To English-speaking Europeans, Parmesan is Parmigiano Reggiano. Anybody who says ‘250g of Parmigiano Reggiano’ at the cheese counter is considered affected and risks not being understood. It is the same in Malta: here it is called ‘Parmiggan’, which is quite literally the Maltese for ‘Parmesan’. And I do know how Parmesan cheese is made: I have had to visit more than one producer in the course of my work.]
Parmesan is a terminology accepted by EU only if endorsed by the Consorzio Parmiggiano Reggiano.
That is obviously not the case – and not possible – in the USA. Parmesan made in in USA is an average quality cheese, which when compared to the real parmiggiano can only be termed as a disgusting fake – aesthetically and taste wise.
http://www.parmigianoreggiano.com/news/2014_2/crescita_consumi_nord_america_breve_negoziati.aspx
Quoting from the article in this link, there are:
“widespread cases of name infringement and of the use of the term “parmesan”, forbidden in Europe to anyone other than the dairies recognized by the Parmigiano Reggiano Consortium, but allowed by American legislation”.
I am no authority on the subject but I do remember one distinction people always made – that was between Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano, the latter being the inferior cheese.
[Daphne – You cannot describe as ‘inferior’ something that is meant to be different. It is not inferior. It is different and costs less.]
May I qualify my comment by saying that the latter was ‘perceived’ as the inferior cheese, mainly due to it being better priced.
Malta is different and also inferior.
Oh dear, I’ve done it now.
Just like Roquefort , Stilton and Gorgonzola ….. all excellent but cannot be compared. Certainly one cannot say that any one of these is inferior to the others. Danish Blue , gobon tat -tursina , is another matter and certainly inferior to all three.
Daphne, I am so glad you brought up this contentious subject.
The likes of Nigel Farage, Norman Lowell, Marine Le Pen and all the other racist anti-immigration parties are far too dishonest to accept the economic benefits of immigration
In the UK most agricultural workers are not local people and that includes those working in abattoirs, as well as others packing salad leaves and soft fruit so that the packaging can proudly display the word ‘local produce’.
Economic benefits for businessmen. No social benefits or any other benefit for that matter and a future of division and unrest.
Realist there are two sides to this one.
I agree that business and ultimately shareholders reap the benefit of a successful, profit making industry.
Since local people are too precious to do manual work, the alternative would be to import it all from abroad. But who stands to benefit then?
Perhaps your belief in ‘a future of division and unrest’ stems from a fear that there aren’t enough jobs to go round.
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-07-24/news/joseph-muscat-meets-prince-charles-5960269827/
“Prime Minister Joseph Muscat chaired the conference and also had a 40 minute audience with the Prince, however due to Royal Household protocol; what was discussed in the meetings could not be given.
No members from the Maltese media delegation were allowed to be present as the requests made were rejected by the Royal household.”
And thank God for that. It saved us some embarrassment.
Forget parmesano, bigilla, kunserva and Gozo chese are the best
http://gazzettadireggio.gelocal.it/cronaca/2012/02/25/news/parmigiano-reggiano-il-futuro-e-in-mano-ai-sikh-1.3220969
I think you are showing your pro-British and anti-Italian and anti-Maltese bias. I met foreigners who liked some of our simple food as pastizzi and hobz biz-zejt. Why are Italian restaurants found all over the world while English restaurants are non existent?
[Daphne – Italian restaurants are found all over the world, David, for the very same reason that Chinese ones are: Italy was a dirt poor place with no prospects where people starved despite the so-called amazing food culture and were forced to emigrate in the hundreds of thousands, probably millions, to every part of the world where they could make a living. Some of them opened restaurants to give their fellow Italian immigrants a taste of home, and those fellow immigrants were the sole patrons for years and years and years. Then in the 1960s (largely driven by Elizabeth David in Britain’s case) and 1970s, Italian food became fashionable among non-Italians, and they began to venture into those restaurants, which were the hipster scene of the period, complete with Chianti bottles still in their baskets, used as lamps and candle-holders, and checked cloths and lobster baskets, and so more were opened.
It’s a roughly similar story with the Chinese. And again I’m being realistic and factual here, so please don’t anybody get too excited and start a ‘pro and anti Italy’ contest. The facts are what they are. You can’t argue with them. If the Spanish had chosen to be more diverse in their emigration patterns, instead of heading off en masse for South America, the world would probably be covered in Spanish restaurants alongside the Chinese and Italian ones. Interestingly, this pattern is happening now as floods of Spanish people leave Spain for other parts of Europe, and Spanish restaurants are popping up all over the place.]
Ah! Don’t forget the Polish delicatessen.
I thought that delikatessen was German. By the way reading all these cheesy comments made me feel peckish.
I meant Polish emigrants. The best salami in the UK isn’t Italian, but Polish.
Ideas vary on which is the best country for food. Many relish Indian cuisine and sushi, while I do not share their tastes.
http://travel.cnn.com/explorations/eat/worlds-best-food-cultures-453528
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/travel-tips-and-articles/76220
Meriam is safe. What a graceful and courageous woman, beautiful.
http://www.ilsecoloxix.it/p/italia/2014/07/24/ARjHIWMB-meriam_italia_arrivo.shtml
Note how the Italian PM refuses the limelight in the video, leaving it to the foreign minister and her staff to answer journalists, and to Meriam herself of course.
The one in green, discrete as ever, the PM’s wife.
Breeding.
Re: ‘Almost anything in Italy – clothes, style, design, architecture, geographical landscape, music, art, creativity, way of life, ambience – is beaten somewhere else,’
No, Daphne, definitely not the music.
[Daphne – You cannot be serious.]
Of course I’m serious. but first of all we need to define ‘music’ and that would mean a separate blog post.
The only composer who can be considered to be better than Verdi is Mozart.
Oh good Lord. Another one’s who stuck in 1900s Sicily.
Definitely not Mozart. Everyone is better than Mozart. Try Chopin or Tchaikovsky. And Beethoven wins hands down.
Have you ever seen script music by Mozart? It’s like something a ten year old would write; just melody with no harmony at all.
Scooter is better than Mozart. So is Falco.
Also, Mozart was the original nerd.