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A Ridiculous History of Processed Cheese · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Histories, a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to the show,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much for
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: tuning in. If you can hear me cheesing on the mic,
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: it's because I'm pleased as punch to be joined with
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: our brain trust of host of producers, starting with super
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: producer mister Max Williams.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Oh hello, I'm here, and you're starting with me.
• 0:49
  Speaker 3: Pleased as cheese.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, so hard. That's mister Noel Brown. The condition Yeah, yep,
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: that's mister Noel Brown. This is gonna be uh, this
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: is gonna be an interesting episode for our pal Max
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: due to the condition. I am Ben Bolin. We are
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: joined vicariously with our research associate Wren and recently, off
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: air we had we had a brief conversation about about
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: foods that we're interested in. We did talk a little
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: bit about Haggis off air after our dairy and Gap episode.
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  Speaker 1: But I feel like it's fair to say conditioned aside
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  Speaker 1: in principle, we're all fans of cheese.
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: I think, so, Max, can you have vegan cheese?
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: Yes, yes, vegan cheese is a go too, And I
• 1:40
  Speaker 4: can actually have soft cheese, so I can have like mazzarella.
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  Speaker 2: It's a harder cheese. I can't have a little chevra.
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: You have a little chevra?
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, okay, I mostly.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Played and just a little ricotta cheese. Where you at
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: with cottage cheese?
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  Speaker 4: Oh, cottage cheese. I should be able to have cottage. Honestly,
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  Speaker 4: I'm bad as gross when it comes to the condition
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  Speaker 4: it is.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean cheese as a concept to We were
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: talking about this on an episode of on a show
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: called Very Special Episodes about Big Parma. How cheese and
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: dairy became a huge part of the American diet. And
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: this is a natural, you know, palette complementer to that conversation. Uh,
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: where we at with cheese?
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  Speaker 3: Whiz?
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  Speaker 1: Where we at with velveta? Where we at with craft singles?
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  Speaker 1: I'll tell you this, man. I know, processed cheese is
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: not the best thing for a human body, but I
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: love it. I am like I might be addicted to
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: velveta at some points in my life.
• 2:49
  Speaker 5: It's a good mac and cheese option, that's for sure.
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  Speaker 5: I think I prefer it to the craft powdered mac
• 2:55
  Speaker 5: and cheese. Yes, I think that's right. And you can
• 2:59
  Speaker 5: also buy it in like these bricks, these soft bricks
• 3:02
  Speaker 5: of Elvida, and then you can mix it with whatever
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  Speaker 5: noodles you choose, you know, so that's a lot of fun.
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  Speaker 5: I'm a big fan of the Craft singles. I gotta
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  Speaker 5: say cheese product because of the way that it doesn't
• 3:14
  Speaker 5: split when you put it on a burger. It gets
• 3:16
  Speaker 5: you that perfect even melts. And if anyone's seen the
• 3:20
  Speaker 5: movie The Menu starring Ray Fines as a maniacal what
• 3:24
  Speaker 5: do you like michelin E type chef, even he sings
• 3:27
  Speaker 5: the praises of Kraft singles. And I think even when
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  Speaker 5: you go to like fancy or burger type places or
• 3:31
  Speaker 5: smash burger joints that are really popular right now, you're gonna.
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  Speaker 3: See that cheese product because of its melting properties.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Mm hmm, yeah, that's true. We'll get to the melty
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  Speaker 1: science behind this. There is a reason that people have,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: at least in the West, held processed cheese in its
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: own rarefied air. It's a familiar ingredient in American cuisine.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: If you travel to other countries and you are, you know,
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  Speaker 1: eating a burger somewhere, the American burger is probably gonna
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: have processed cheese on it because it became synonymous with
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: the United States.
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  Speaker 5: One hundred percent. The question then becomes ben as you
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  Speaker 5: have alluded to, what the heck is in this stuff?
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  Speaker 5: This cheese product, processed has a real negative connotation in
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  Speaker 5: general when we're talking about nutrition. Is this stuff as
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  Speaker 5: plastic as the thin plastic coating that it comes in?
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  Speaker 1: That is the question for the court today, mister Brown,
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  Speaker 1: I believe we can begin with good dues. A lot
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: of us will be relieved, hopefully to learn that the
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  Speaker 1: main ingredient in all processed cheese is still to this day,
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  Speaker 1: actual cheese.
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  Speaker 3: That's right.
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  Speaker 5: They just can't call it cheese because it's the percentage
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  Speaker 5: isn't enough for it to be considered pure cheese. It is,
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  Speaker 5: in fact cheese product you'll see often listed on those packages.
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  Speaker 5: According to Food the Alex Delaney in a twenty eighteen
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  Speaker 5: article for a Bon Appetite, this is what they have
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  Speaker 5: to say about it. Processed cheese isn't one hundred percent cheese.
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  Speaker 5: Most of the time. It hovers around fifty percent cheese,
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  Speaker 5: sometimes more and sometimes less. But at a base level,
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  Speaker 5: processed cheese is real cheese cut with other non cheese ingredients. Okay,
• 5:19
  Speaker 5: we stepped on a little.
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: Bit, they stepped on the products. Yes, shout out to
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: the wire and all the hip hop that I love.
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  Speaker 1: But there's good news still because these non cheese ingredients
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  Speaker 1: are a mission critical factor in the meltiness that we
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  Speaker 1: all adore. Right, the word process, as you mentioned, has
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  Speaker 1: a negative connotation, kind of like saying scheme in US
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  Speaker 1: English book callback callback. But really it's it's unfair to
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: immediately condemn something just because the word processed is used
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  Speaker 1: to describe it. You know, butter is processed milk, grape
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  Speaker 1: juice is wine too, I guess is just processed from grapes.
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  Speaker 1: You have to have some sort of intervention to create
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  Speaker 1: the end thing.
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  Speaker 5: Well sure, I mean you could even go so far
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  Speaker 5: as to say the process of fermentation could fall into
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  Speaker 5: this category.
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  Speaker 3: You know.
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  Speaker 5: So the buzziness and the negative connotation of the term processed,
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  Speaker 5: you know, causes quite a bit of hullabaloo. And I
• 6:26
  Speaker 5: think maybe something ado about nothing.
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  Speaker 1: M Yeah, yeah, I think that's a very fair point because,
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  Speaker 1: you know, depending on the kind of processed cheese food
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  Speaker 1: products that's one for the Americans. Depending on the type
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: of fig you're looking at it could be made entirely
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: of ingredients that the ordinary consumer would consider natural. If
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: we're talking processed cheese, it usually does begin with a
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: shredded our pal Lurin would say actual facts cheese, colby
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: or cheddar. Right.
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  Speaker 3: It's then melted and mixed with water, milk, and oil.
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  Speaker 3: This is added to the hot cheese, hot cheese.
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  Speaker 5: I love that phrase hot chee good, just you should
• 7:15
  Speaker 5: use it in regular conversation to refer to something that's awesome.
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  Speaker 5: At this stage, the ingredients start to separate from one
• 7:20
  Speaker 5: another because dairy and oil have different properties, sort of
• 7:23
  Speaker 5: the way olive oil sits on top of the rest
• 7:26
  Speaker 5: of the liquid inside salad dressing and you have to
• 7:28
  Speaker 5: shake it up, or like the way the blobbies and
• 7:30
  Speaker 5: lava lamps can exist inside the same container but never
• 7:33
  Speaker 5: actually combined. It's sort of a is it a suspension?
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  Speaker 5: Is that the terms it means.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: That they they are segregated. Basically, they're not mixing into
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  Speaker 1: one homogeneous substance. And the reason that you have processed
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  Speaker 1: cheese at all, Folks, is due to emulsifying agents. And
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  Speaker 1: emulsion is a mixture of two or more liquids that
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: would ordinarily be in that lava lamp situation, and you
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: are able to include some intervening factor or substance that
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: brings them together. In the case of processed cheese, we're
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: thinking stuff like sodium citrate. That would be one of
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: the most famous examples that I can conjure up. Also,
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  Speaker 1: bonus points, sodium is a preservative, so this makes processed
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  Speaker 1: cheese lasts longer than the fresh cheese you would get
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: at the farmer's market.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely mean.
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  Speaker 5: Think of the way naval rations are preserved, and like
• 8:35
  Speaker 5: salt barrels, you know, and salted meats and all of
• 8:38
  Speaker 5: that stuff, very much the same situation. The final consistency
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  Speaker 5: of the cheese is ultimately determined by the amount of
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  Speaker 5: emulsifier that's used, the temperature, the moisture content, and the
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  Speaker 5: degree of blending that takes place throughout this process.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, this is already sounding a little complicated for some
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  Speaker 1: of us in the crowd, But also remember, folks, if
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: you introduced or described natural cheese to anyone who had
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: never encountered it before, it would sound pretty crazy, right.
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  Speaker 1: You would say, you know, we got milk, right, we
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  Speaker 1: get milk from these other animals and then we do
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  Speaker 1: this weird process to it, right, as you said, Noel,
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  Speaker 1: all cheese is processed milk, right and then and then
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: sometimes we just let certain bacteria go go hogwild on when.
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  Speaker 5: You're really unpack it like that, Ben, it is kind
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  Speaker 5: of gross if it weren't so delicious and crack like
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  Speaker 5: that is the thing. There have been studies that say
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  Speaker 5: that cheese can be as addictive as crack cocaine.
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  Speaker 1: Oh wow, well, good thing. I tried cheese first. I'll
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: be addicted to that one. I think we both will.
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  Speaker 1: We also have to, as Ren points out, address something
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  Speaker 1: called easy cheese. Easy cheese is different from cheese whiz,
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  Speaker 1: which we're gonna spend some time on. Easy cheese does
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  Speaker 1: come in an aerosol can, but apparently it's not a
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: true aerosol.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right.
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  Speaker 5: And that's because a thin layer of plastic at the
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  Speaker 5: bottom of the can prevents the propellant that is included
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  Speaker 5: from mixing with the cheese, so it does have that
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  Speaker 5: separate component. This separation allows the cheese to emerge from
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  Speaker 5: the can in a nice ropey strand rather than a
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  Speaker 5: fine mist like a traditional aerosol spray like.
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  Speaker 3: A rope strand I said what I said, you said.
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  Speaker 1: What you said, and I've got your back, I got
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: your thank you. So easy cheese is interesting because there
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  Speaker 1: is natural cheese in it, but it is not the protagonist.
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  Speaker 1: It's not the main character of the ingredient list. Instead,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: you're going to see stuff like wave protein concentrate and
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: of course canola oil. It also gets its fluorescent orange
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  Speaker 1: color from naturally derived sources. So we're already seeing that
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  Speaker 1: processed cheese has its own panopoly of very distinct entities.
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  Speaker 1: If we want to talk about the current state of cheese,
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  Speaker 1: I guess we have to do a little ridiculous history
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  Speaker 1: about cheese in general.
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  Speaker 5: Yes, cheese, one oh one, So let us venture together
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  Speaker 5: to the Swiss Alps.
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  Speaker 3: Yes.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. The earliest mention of what we would call processed
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  Speaker 1: cheese actually comes from Homer, comes from the Iliad, and
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: this is written in around like eight hundred BCE, and
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  Speaker 1: it talks about how you could goat or sheep milk
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: with wide and flour, kind of a precedent for fondue.
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  Speaker 1: And that's where we get to, as you were saying,
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  Speaker 1: Switzerland the thirteen hundreds, this is where we see the
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  Speaker 1: real versions of cheese exist everywhere, but this is where
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: you see the real fancy cheese, guys.
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  Speaker 5: And this was created in the Mental region of Switzerland
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  Speaker 5: and the thirteen hundreds. And you may have heard of
• 12:28
  Speaker 5: mental cheese, which I believe is the well, there's raklets,
• 12:32
  Speaker 5: of course, but menthal cheese is another kind that is
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  Speaker 5: used and melted down if I'm not mistaken for a
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  Speaker 5: fondue situation. So Swiss cheese is considered an early example
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  Speaker 5: of processed cheese because rennet is one of the main ingredients.
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  Speaker 5: Is itself a preservative traditionally found in the stomach lining
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  Speaker 5: of livestock. It is an enzyme that causes the protein
• 12:52
  Speaker 5: and milk to coagulate. So I'm sorry I may have
• 12:55
  Speaker 5: been off base and calling it a preservative. It is, however,
• 12:58
  Speaker 5: a chemical additive and the same way that preservatives are.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, And because of that rennet, because of those
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: enzymes added to the original product, Swiss cheese is considered processed. Now,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: let's let's stick with fondue. I've got I've got some
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: I almost said I have some rennet. I've got some
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: mmental in the fridge right now. So we're interested in
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: learning more about this. If you go a little bit
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: forward in time to the eighteen hundreds, you'll see the
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: next iteration of fondue. It arrives to us from the
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: Swiss Alps, and at the time, just like we were
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: talking about off air with Hagis, at the time, this
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  Speaker 1: was not considered a fancy special occasion thing like going
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: to the melting pot or another fondue restaurant. Instead, this
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: was what we would call a struggled meal like people
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  Speaker 1: ate it because they had to work with what they possessed.
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  Speaker 5: One hundred percent. Winter in the Swiss Alps was rough, long, harsh,
• 13:59
  Speaker 5: and freezing, so the peasants had to use this aged
• 14:02
  Speaker 5: cheese and bread because fresh produce just wasn't on the
• 14:06
  Speaker 5: table literally and figuraly. By combining their cheese with flour, wine,
• 14:11
  Speaker 5: and some herbs like you mentioned earlier, ban over an
• 14:13
  Speaker 5: open flame, these peasants were able to create a very
• 14:18
  Speaker 5: tasty and long lasting food item that would take the
• 14:23
  Speaker 5: edge off winter's chill. According to the Dairy Farmers of
• 14:27
  Speaker 5: Wisconsin website at Wisconsin Cheese dot.
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: Com, m yeah, the method that people use to make
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: American cheese today largely was also created by a couple
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: of Swedes, Swedish guys named Walter Gerber and Franz Stettler.
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  Speaker 1: In nineteen eleven, they said, all right, let's make something
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: that we can ship off to warmer areas of the world.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: And our super move will be to ship this without
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: its spoiling. And they added sodium citrate to this melted
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: emmentol to this hot cheese. And they did you know,
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: their experiment was successful. They made a product that could
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: last longer on the shelf. But there was someone else
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: in the game, someone who was living across the pond,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: as we say, who grew his own kind of hot
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: cheese science experiment hot cheese, resulting in a business empire
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  Speaker 1: that is worth over thirty seven billion US dollars as
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: we record today, It's time to metium noll oh big Cheese.
• 15:40
  Speaker 5: In nineteen sixteen, Canadian American immigrant James Lewis Kraft with
• 15:45
  Speaker 5: a K you know it, obtained his first patent four
• 15:48
  Speaker 5: processed cheese. Along with his little brother Norman, the Crafts
• 15:53
  Speaker 5: would transform the landscape of the supermarkets. In its very
• 15:57
  Speaker 5: first iteration, craft cheese was slightly different from the line of.
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: Products that we know today. How is it different?
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: You know? First off, it's sold in jars or cans
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: because it doesn't have a mulsifying salts Noel. Before we continue,
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: I have a pitch for the Ridiculous History Cinematic Universe.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, please, okay, dude, what if we make
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: a film, a movie about James and Norman Kraft and
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: how they created this process cheese Empire, and we just
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: call it the Craft with a k light is a
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: feather stiff as a board? Throw in some occult reference.
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: Why not? You know we could make them like Vampire
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: Hunters too or something.
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the Craft, only.
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: If it's a spiritual sequel to the episode we're going
• 16:46
  Speaker 4: to do about the Kellogg Brothers.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: Oh have we not done the Kellogg Brothers episode yet? Oh?
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: We've well, movie correction, we'll make were gonna make the
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: movie also?
• 16:54
  Speaker 5: Oh okay, Yes, and they're also vampire Hunters, great rival
• 16:58
  Speaker 5: vampire Hunters.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: Yes, and the way they kill vampires, but.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: You can't write that. You can't say that, right.
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: I like the idea though, that they're both using dairy
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: to fight vampires. I will say this is a very
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: anti vampire stance we're taking. And there's reason because vampires
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: can't eat cheese.
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: Is that true?
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they can't eat change.
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: Okay, they're lactose intolerant then.
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, that's the that's the real problem with vampires.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: You heard it here first, folks. In nineteen twenty one,
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: we know that the Craft Company did patent or patent
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: applications for multifying salts.
• 17:43
  Speaker 5: In nineteen forty four, however, Craft secured another patent, this
• 17:47
  Speaker 5: time for the process that led to the delightful little
• 17:51
  Speaker 5: Craft singles that we know and some of us love today.
• 17:55
  Speaker 5: This was a major improvement to the former loaf situation.
• 17:58
  Speaker 5: These little slices account today for roughly seventy four percent
• 18:02
  Speaker 5: of all processed cheese sales in the entirety of the
• 18:05
  Speaker 5: United States.
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: Wild right, wild. This goes into some of our other
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: explorations about how the US government in particular got so
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: deep in bed with big Dairy, Big Parma Man.
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: Check out that episode, by the way, was it called
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: very special Episodes?
• 18:25
  Speaker 5: Yeah?
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: Big How cheese got in everything?
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: Yep?
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: Featuring Ben Bolin and his buddy Alex French.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much, man. It's it's a weird one,
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: for sure. It is a true story, and Craft does
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: occur within that story. We also learned something we mentioned
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: on previous episodes of Stuff they Don't want you to know, Noel,
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: which is that the US government, as we record, is
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: currently storing one point four billion pounds of processed cheese
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: in this underground cave syte them in Missouri.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: A bunker situation. Yes, b bro, I've got a pitch
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: for you.
• 19:05
  Speaker 5: What if when Elon Musk blows the doors off of
• 19:09
  Speaker 5: Fort Knox, it's not full of gold bricks at all,
• 19:12
  Speaker 5: but just bricks of velveta.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: I love it, oh, because they would look like gold
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: you've thought about. That's smart.
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: Liquid gold is what we call it.
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: Cheese.
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: This is this is weird. We have to dive into this.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: Why does Uncle Sam have over a billion pounds of
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: cheese hidden weigh in caves? That is true. You know
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: it sounds weird, but it is true. It's because in
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies, the US had a milk shortage, but
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: the demand for dairy did not decrease, and as a result,
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: dairy products, everything that falls under the category of dairy,
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: the prices for those spiked by thirty percent. It's kind
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: of similar to what we're seeing with eggs in the US. Today.
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: Is this the government cheese everyone's always talking to this
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: gets to it.
• 20:02
  Speaker 5: Yeah, okay, great, So as we're currently seeing with eggs.
• 20:05
  Speaker 5: Like you said, when inflation impacts the cost of an
• 20:07
  Speaker 5: important staple food, A, people get irritated because they can't
• 20:13
  Speaker 5: afford one of these common items that are relied upon
• 20:17
  Speaker 5: for sustenance, and B they buy less of that product
• 20:20
  Speaker 5: because they just don't have any other choice. But then
• 20:23
  Speaker 5: enter our hero in the situation. I guess our buddy,
• 20:26
  Speaker 5: President Richard not a crook, Nixon, who did have a
• 20:30
  Speaker 5: bit of a plan here, Old.
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: Tricky he says. He says, Look, we're going to pass
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: the Agriculture and Consumer Protection Act of nineteen seventy three.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: This did have price controls, it did have subsidies. It
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: said milk should only be, you know, at this reasonable price,
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: and if you're a farmer and you're struggling, we're going
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: to give you a little cash on the side to
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: help you make it to the next year. We're also
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: getting rid of all these crazy import quotas we had
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: from the Great Depression. This band aidd the discrepancy between
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: supply and demand. But you know, Nixon probably had some
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: back room smoky deal.
• 21:15
  Speaker 5: I think that's kind of a thing.
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: I guess, wouldn't it.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: It's something in the eyes.
• 21:20
  Speaker 5: I think you're right, very shifty tricky. But if you
• 21:23
  Speaker 5: know anything about tricky, Dick Nixon probably isn't cheese related
• 21:27
  Speaker 5: or dairy related. A bit more of that old that hotel. Yes, yeah,
• 21:32
  Speaker 5: I gate some water. So President Jimmy Carter, classic Georgia boyp.
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: Only just recently thought he was going to live forever.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we had all hoped. He took office in nineteen
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: seventy seven, and it looked like the Nixon administration had
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: over corrected with dairy products and supply and demand. Because
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: now dairy products are so cheap that farmers are losing
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: money by running their businesses. You can't move the milk
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: fast enough. The economics no longer makes sense. So production
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: is still continuing at the same rate because they already
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: have all these cows, right, they already have all these
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: dairy cows, and they're going to keep making milk. Congress
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: and President Carter, they get incredibly concerned that if they
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: allow these farmers to go into other businesses, they're just
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: going to create another dairy shortage. So now we see
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: another big government act, the Food and Agriculture Act of
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven.
• 22:46
  Speaker 5: Right, it supply more subsidies to dairy and with the
• 22:49
  Speaker 5: government buying all of that access product, farmers were able
• 22:52
  Speaker 5: to continue on as usual. But the government did now
• 22:56
  Speaker 5: find itself with a bit of a cheese glut.
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: Hot cheese, hot cheese. They got that hot cheese. They
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: had so much stuff. First off, I would point out
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: they had so much milk, and milk is cartoonishly perishable, right,
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: so they had to transform it into something that would
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: last a little longer, which means their next move are
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: going to be things like butter and cheese. And by
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: the time Ronald Reagan comes after President Carter in the
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: early nineteen eighties, the government has bought up five over
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: five hundred million pounds of processed cheese just to keep
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: the dairy industry going.
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: That's wild.
• 23:37
  Speaker 5: That does not seem like the best arrangement. What on
• 23:41
  Speaker 5: earth did they do with all of this cheese? According
• 23:43
  Speaker 5: to a USDA official in nineteen eighty one in an
• 23:46
  Speaker 5: article in the Washington Post, probably the cheapest and most
• 23:49
  Speaker 5: practical thing to do would be to dump it in
• 23:51
  Speaker 5: the ocean. But Reagan was a frugal man. He did
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: not believe he was a waste not, want not type fellow.
• 23:58
  Speaker 5: He wanted that hot cheese the trip down.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: He wanted that hot cheese to trickle down in ropy string.
• 24:05
  Speaker 5: Oh yeah, thank you man, thank you.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: So it's nineteen eighty one, then President Reagan is coming
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: to the public in December, and he says, at a
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: time when American families are under increasing financial pressure, their
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: government cannot sit by and watch millions of pounds of
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: food turned to waste. This is where his administration founds
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: the Temporary Emergency Food Assistance Program. This is the government cheese.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: They took all the cheese they had made in this
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: deal with the dairy industry, and they distributed three hundred
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: million pounds of it to populations that they saw as
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: in need. At the same time, by the way, they're
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: putting cheese in every kind of military like everything the
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: army eats is getting cheese.
• 24:59
  Speaker 5: If you look images of this stuff, it looks like
• 25:02
  Speaker 5: a brick of plastique, you know, some sort of like
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: explosive putty. It says pasteurized process process not processed. By
• 25:11
  Speaker 5: the way, cheddar cheese keep under refrigeration. And then there's
• 25:17
  Speaker 5: a little sign off purchased and distributed by the United
• 25:20
  Speaker 5: States Department of Agriculture, Washington DC and.
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: Ian DC cheese.
• 25:26
  Speaker 5: The idea of you know, maybe it's certainly antiquated now,
• 25:29
  Speaker 5: but I remember growing up it was sort of like
• 25:32
  Speaker 5: a joke kind of thing to talk about people being
• 25:34
  Speaker 5: on government cheese, sort of a crassway referring to maybe
• 25:37
  Speaker 5: people that were less fortunate than others.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, one hundred percent. There was some insensitivity in those
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: days and in the present day, because the government has
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: once again begun buying up a lot of cheese, and
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: it's entirely because they have to prop up and assist
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: the domestic dairy industry. Public demand for dairy products has declined.
• 26:01
  Speaker 5: Ben, where do you think the use of the word
• 26:03
  Speaker 5: cheese referring to money came from. Do you think it
• 26:06
  Speaker 5: has anything to do with this whole like we've got
• 26:09
  Speaker 5: way too much cheese situation.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: I wonder that is a good question. Let's see, if
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: we're looking at cheese as money slang, maybe it does
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: go back to welfare and assistance. Maybe that's when people
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: started talking about having the cheddar, having the cheese.
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: Yep, if you look at urban Dictionary.
• 26:29
  Speaker 5: One of the entries refers to it as slang for money,
• 26:33
  Speaker 5: referring to a form of welfare where people would get
• 26:36
  Speaker 5: government cheese handed out to people in what we're referred
• 26:39
  Speaker 5: to as poverty lines. And I think that's a bit
• 26:41
  Speaker 5: of an antiquated term as well. But cheese comes from
• 26:45
  Speaker 5: the term government cheese, but in slang it's referring to money,
• 26:48
  Speaker 5: because that's where you get your welfare checks as well
• 26:52
  Speaker 5: as that government cheddar.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: Makes sense, right, beautiful cheese as cash money you can
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: eat right now. Farmers have so much extra milk that
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: they're reportedly dumping it into fields into lagoons.
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: Not in the ocean at least, right.
• 27:08
  Speaker 5: No, oh, and Ben, just doubling back to what you
• 27:11
  Speaker 5: mentioned about the excess milk being dumped into lagoons. These
• 27:15
  Speaker 5: are referred to as anaerobic lagoons and are a way
• 27:19
  Speaker 5: of I believe, storing and treating livestock manure because of
• 27:25
  Speaker 5: the anaerobic ability for it to be broken down by
• 27:29
  Speaker 5: that products.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you absolutely nailed it. It's a way to sort
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: of mitigate the waste or the potential for other nasty
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: things to happen when you throw a bunch of animal
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: junk and milk into the environment. So right now the
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: US government has more cheese in its caves than it
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: did when Ronald Reagan was doing his best to give
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: it all away. Big Parma is realss Cheese is awesome.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: We have to thank everybody who's listening to this in
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: the dairy industry. Thanks for tuning in.
• 28:10
  Speaker 5: Folks, oh Ben, Before we wrap up it being I
• 28:13
  Speaker 5: believe as this publishes National Cheese Steak Month.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: National cheese Steak data is March twenty four.
• 28:20
  Speaker 5: Okay, we Ben, You and I have traveled to Philadelphia
• 28:24
  Speaker 5: on numerous occasions and have enjoyed authentic Philly cheese steaks.
• 28:30
  Speaker 5: If you're in Philly, you just call it a steak.
• 28:32
  Speaker 5: But the traditional way of eating a Philly steak is
• 28:36
  Speaker 5: with cheese whiz, not with I mean, we love a
• 28:38
  Speaker 5: sharp provolone excellent edition as well, but the classic style
• 28:43
  Speaker 5: is with grilled onions and cheese whiz. Ben, you found
• 28:47
  Speaker 5: a great article that explains the origin of that.
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: Ah. Yes, the oral history of the Philly cheese steak
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: with Big Big thanks to our pal Victor fiel Real.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: You can find this on phillymac dot com. It's a
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: fascinating story that might be an episode all its own.
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: We did something about Philly cheese steaks. Was it on
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: ridiculous history?
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: I think it was. Maybe it just was part of another,
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: a larger broader topic.
• 29:19
  Speaker 5: But I swear we talked about the history of Philly
• 29:22
  Speaker 5: cheese sticks at some point or another. Because I I
• 29:24
  Speaker 5: know way too much about it. We should look back
• 29:26
  Speaker 5: on that and maybe do an update.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I've got to ask you, inquiring minds want to
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: know Noel Max again, condition aside, what's your take? What's
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: the right cheese for a Philly cheese steak.
• 29:37
  Speaker 5: I don't think I've ever had it with Wiz. I
• 29:39
  Speaker 5: really like it with sharp Provolone. I just think it's
• 29:42
  Speaker 5: a superior cheese. I'm not a huge canned cheese kind
• 29:46
  Speaker 5: of guy, though I do like a craft single melted
• 29:50
  Speaker 5: gently over a delicious smash burger.
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: How about you Max, with especially it's been.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: You're gonna keep going with that? Huh.
• 30:00
  Speaker 4: I'm gonna beat them both out now.
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: So folks, folks, we would love to hear your opinions
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: on cheese steaks. I did mess up one time. Nol
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: and our pal Matt Frederick and I were doing a
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: live show in Philadelphia, and at the very end I
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: asked people to recommend which Philly cheese steak shop we
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: should go to, and they were very they were very
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: strident and contradicting opinions.
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: Right, there's the two kind of you know, classic ones.
• 30:33
  Speaker 5: There's Pats and then the other one that's right across
• 30:36
  Speaker 5: the street from it. But those are almost like locals
• 30:38
  Speaker 5: think those are sort of like played out, and everyone's
• 30:42
  Speaker 5: gonna have some kind of off the beaten path steak
• 30:45
  Speaker 5: joint that they will recommend. I think Dallassandro's is a
• 30:49
  Speaker 5: popular one, if I'm not missing.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: It's the good ones are always some person's name. That's
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: the rule of thumbs.
• 30:57
  Speaker 5: There, Dallasandro's Steaks and Hogies Philly Slvania.
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: I have heard really great things about that.
• 31:02
  Speaker 5: But then if you go to Reddit, someone says, here,
• 31:05
  Speaker 5: Delasandra sucks, go to Angelo's or John's Rose.
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: Exactly what happened, dude? When I asked people in Philadelphia,
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: you know, I thought they wanted to talk to us
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: about the show, but they were just going, no, beat
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: me your Max, everyone, Na mank you nicks, Na Delesandra.
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: We like we went to Knicks.
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so with that, folks, thank you, as always so
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: much for tuning in. Thanks to our research associate Ren,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: thanks to our super producer mister Max Williams. Who else,
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: who else?
• 31:36
  Speaker 5: Oh geez, Alex Williams to compose our theme. Christophrasciotis needs
• 31:40
  Speaker 5: Jeff Coates here in spirit.
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: The Rude Dudes at Ridiculous Crime. Tune in. If you
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: like our show, you'll love theirs. And thanks also, of
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: course to everybody with an opinion of a cheese steak.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: This episode has made me so hungry. I think we're
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: trending toward lunchtime.
• 31:59
  Speaker 3: Big time. It is proper lunchtime.
• 32:01
  Speaker 5: As we wrap this episode up, Ben, thanks for cheasing it.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: Up with me, man and also with you.
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: We'll see you next time, folks.
• 32:14
  Speaker 5: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
• 32:18
  Speaker 5: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows