Roquefort: a blue cheese from a small village with a long history

Roquefort has a long history, having been around for at least 1000 years. It comes from a small village in southern France, with impressive caves that are ideal for aging cheese, and has become renowned all over the world.

Sources
Donnelly, Catherine, ed. The Oxford Companion to Cheese. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016.
Dumas, Emilie, Alice Feurtey, Ricardo C. Rodríguez de la Vega, Stéphanie Le Prieur, Alodie Snirc, Monika Coton, Anne Thierry, Emmanuel Coton, Mélanie Le Piver, Daniel Roueyre, Jeanne Ropars, Antoine Branca and Tatiana Giraud. "Independent Domestication Events in the Blue-Cheese Fungus Penicillium Roqueforti." bioRxiv (2019): 451773.
Kindstedt, Paul. Cheese and Culture: A History of Cheese and Its Place in Western Civilisation. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2012.
Kurlansky, Mark. Milk: A 10,000-Year History. London: Bloomsbury, 2018.
Pliny the Elder. The Natural History. Medford, MA: Taylor and Francis, 1855.
Tunick, Michael H. The Science of Cheese. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014.
Venel, Gabriel-François. "Fromage." In Encyclopédie Ou Dictionnaire Raisonné des Sciences, des Arts et des Métiers, edited by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert, vol. 7, 333-334. Paris, 1757.
———. "Cheese." In The Encyclopedia of Diderot & D'alembert Collaborative Translation Project, edited by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert, Translated by Malcolm Eden. Ann Abor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2007.
Whittaker, Dick and Jack Goody. "Rural Manufacturing in the Rouergue from Antiquity to the Present: The Examples of Pottery and Cheese." Comparative Studies in Society and History 43, no. 2 (2001): 225-245.

Images

00:00 Introduction
01:27 Possible Roman Origins?
03:12 Favored by Charlemagne?
07:47 Roquefort-sur-Soulzon
12:41 Bread, Mold, and Caves
16:11 A Sheep’s Milk Cheese
17:49 Outro

#roquefort #cheese #history #cheesehistory

[sarahmodica]

I've never seen anyone else know so much about cheese!! I love watching your videos while I eat cheese, and I really love your accent so I listen to your videos as I fall asleep!! Thanks!!

[kendebusk]

I'm not sure I've ever tasted a better cheese. Please don't stop with these videos!

And although Brie is delicious, it can't hold a candle to a good bleu like this one.

[nowjustanother]

I've got a Roquefort in my refrigerator right now! It's one of my favorite cheeses.

[GoOnBerlin]

thank you for an interesting video.
Roquefort is one of my favorite cheeses 🙂

[txtacos-]

Need more vids 👍👍👍learned so much was on the fence on Gorgonzola and Roquefort

[lynmeadows]

Totally amazing and interesting as usual and thank you so much for all the research and effort you put in.😁😍🤗💝💖💗

[heidisnow]

Wow! This is so cool. This is the first legit reason I've found for a restricted named item to have the restriction. Thank you for doing that research and sharing it with us!

[vaazig]

One of my favourite cheeses. Thanks for the historic overview!

[fern]

12:57 Yes ! Do you want the recipe for making Penicillium Roqueforti?
Let's start with the PENICILLIUM ROQUEFORTI.(spores)
-buy sourdough rye bread
-buy a roquefort (for the mold of blue. roquefort)
-spread the molds from the Roquefort on the crumb on both sides of the slice of bread
-hide your bread in an airtight tupperware
- leave at room temperature for 7 to 10 DAYS because in 19 days, all the bread will be moldy.
- turn the slice of bread daily.
you will find white rings there
and verdigris or greenish blue rings.
- Cut your slice of bread into small pieces, let dry.
For the next 5 years, you have enough to sow PENICILLIUM ROQUEFORTI spores in your milk.
Thus was produced the Penicillium roqueforti which was poured into raw milk or inoculated into the curd.
📌You don't have Roquefort cheese to spread ? and take a slice of wholemeal bread, put in a damp tupperware, let it mold... then dry everything... you have 3 years of Penicillium Roqueforti. Best regards from France !

[ashleya]

you've captured a lot of my frustration as a research nerd, and the trouble I've found in trying to find historical evidence of different cheeses. It's all so wrapped up in traditional process that have been lost and restarted over the centuries, historical mythmaking, and EU trade status.

[soulshiversasmr]

Definitely loved learning about it. Keep it up you are awesome!!

[stevendaniel]

Excellent video. Smart cookie !!
Thank

[dc-k]

Another great video. I learned interesting cheese facts as always, and I love the idea of using cheese to pay cave rent!

[Arab--Man]

some people addicted to bad things
im addicted to Roquefort 😂, not the best quality comes here in Arabia but I still buy it .
❤ thank you France for what you did to me 😊

[masonix_angel_morningstar]

I think blue cheese was made accidentally. The cheese grew mold. Someone tried, liked the flavour. He didn't get sick or die after experimenting. And viola! Let's serve rotten cheese.

[ikke.gernoasje]

Brie hasn't a intense strong taste, but camembert does and looks like brie too. And then you have some cheeses that are made of sheepsmilk with a molded brownish external coat. Those too are a type of cave riped cheese with a strong flavor.

[maksphoto]

How to invent a delicacy - stick some food in a damp, mouldy cave.

[cjaquilino]

6:28 The darn truth. Never take D.O.P, A.O.P, P.D.O, at face value. Same is true in pizza, where we have an org called the AVPN/VPN or "true" Vera Pizza Napoletana org.

They make claims about pizza history even an amateur researcher can debunk on Google, like me.

[masonix_angel_morningstar]

I don't think the emperor would be picking at cheese if he thought it was rancid. He would immediately demand why was he served rotted cheese

[cheesehistory]

What do you all think? Was Charlemagne eating Roquefort, Brie, or something else?