It seems incongruous, but the famously cheese-loving French have “turned away” from one of their greatest culinary contributions. Since France went into lockdown in mid-March, cheese consumption has decreased by nearly 60 per cent. As a result, an industry association warns, more than 5,000 tons of cheese could go to waste if they don’t start eating more — and fast.
Typically among the world’s top consumers, French people are now being asked to do “what you can for cheese.” In addition to changing habits, restaurant closures and declining international trade have contributed to a slump in sales since the pandemic began, Michel Lacoste, the president of the National Council of Appellations of Dairy Origin (CNAOL), told CNN.
While firm cheeses such as Comté or Beaufort can last for months unopened, soft cheeses — an especially rich category in France, which includes Camembert and brie — have a much shorter window. “For 80 per cent of cheeses, the shelf life does not exceed eight weeks, and for some, even less than a month,” CNAOL said in a press release announcing its #fromagissons (“let’s act for cheese”) campaign aimed at drumming up support for the industry.
As with Belgium’s glut of french fry potatoes, which led farmers to promote eating frites twice a week during the coronavirus crisis, the French cheese surplus strikes at the heart of intangible cultural heritage. “Eat cheese, make a fair trade act to maintain the French culture, the French tradition, the French heritage that we all share,” Lacoste told CNN.
The cheese surplus isn’t confined to France. Seemingly in direct opposition to our comfort food cravings, the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in Canadians eating less of both french fries and cheese. While demand for milk has stayed more or less the same, our appetite for cheese (and cream) has taken a significant downturn, Mathieu Frigon, CEO and president of the Dairy Processors Association of Canada, told Global News.
This dip is primarily because we’re cooking for ourselves, says Jo-Ann McArthur, president of Nourish Food Marketing. Just like we tend to eat fries at quick-service restaurants, we eat more cheese when we’re dining out than we do at home. “Part of it is we’re just eating less of it but in some ways, it’s less accessible to us,” says McArthur. “A lot of channels where we would normally buy cheese as consumers — farmers’ markets and boutique stores — perhaps haven’t been open depending on your province.”
One of the key challenges facing artisan cheesemakers especially, is being able to connect with consumers. Some cheesemakers, distributors and retailers are now offering delivery (cheeseloverca.wordpress.com has a running list of businesses across the country) to bridge the gap left by restaurant and farmers’ market closures.
For Ruth Klahsen, owner of Monforte Dairy in Stratford, Ont., the pandemic has meant rethinking her business model, which was built on direct relationships with restaurants and farmers’ markets.
When restaurants either closed or switched to delivery/takeout-only, Klahsen started offering a $60 box of cheese for delivery in London, Stratford and Toronto. “People are not pushing back on the price point at all. It ties up a fair bit of labour and a fair bit of time, but it’s been really effective. I would say it’s saved us,” she says. But when it comes to industry-specific campaigns encouraging people to eat more of a certain food as a way of dealing with surpluses, she thinks we should take a wider perspective.
“What concerns me more than anything is what the culture of food and agriculture will be in 2021,” says Klahsen. The current situation, while undeniably a challenge, she adds, also presents opportunities. It’s a chance to reconsider how we engage with food systems. In purchasing any kind of food — whether fruit, vegetables, beef, poultry, pork or dairy products — we can choose to support like-minded producers.
“It shouldn’t just be about dairy. I think it should be about everything that we consume. I don’t think dairy trumps beef or pork, as long as it’s sustainable. For me, it’s the ethics behind how things are produced and raised that matters more than what the commodity is,” says Klahsen. “I love cheese. I love making cheese. But I think (these campaigns) should be about how we actually conduct our lives as consumers in the future.”
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