
Tiny mites spark big battle over imports of French cheese (2013) - Vlad81b
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/05/11/180570160/tiny-mites-spark-big-battle-over-imports-of-french-cheese
======
robin_reala
Charles Babbage (of Analytical Engine fame) wrote an entire chapter of his
sort-of-autobiography where he imagines life from the perspective of a
cheesemite philosopher:
[https://www.gutenberg.org/files/57532/57532-h/57532-h.htm#p4...](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/57532/57532-h/57532-h.htm#p406)

(I did a production of this book as a nice epub for Standard Ebooks:
[https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/charles-
babbage/passages-f...](https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/charles-
babbage/passages-from-the-life-of-a-philosopher) if you want something for
your reader.)

~~~
aspenmayer
Thanks for this. It’s great you did this and shared it.

------
sjackso
I once bought a piece of mimollete cheese on a lark. When I ate it later that
day, I was extremely impressed by the rich and nutty flavor, and wondered how
I had reached adulthood without knowing about something so delicious.

So I looked it up on wikipedia. And learned about the mites.

When I looked closely at the rind of the the cheese I'd bought-- sure enough,
it was busy with tiny, transparent crawlies.

I still like mimolette, but there's something in the back of my brain that
cannot forget the mites. The innocent bliss of that first experience is
impossible to recapture.

~~~
GuiA
You have similar mites living on your face too.

[https://www.npr.org/sections/health-
shots/2019/05/21/7250878...](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-
shots/2019/05/21/725087824/meet-the-mites-that-live-on-your-face)

~~~
Retric
Human mites are up to 0.016in while cheese mites can be about twice that size
0.028in making them much easier to see.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demodex_folliculorum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demodex_folliculorum)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrophagus_casei](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrophagus_casei)

~~~
sjackso
Yes, illogical though it be, the fact that my eyelash dust might be motile
bothers me less than seeing live arachnids in my food.

------
wazoox
If you keep your cheese warm enough (not refrigerated for 4 to 6 hours) you
can even see the mites run in your plate at times :) They're not actually
microscopic, though they're really, really small. There are cheeses that gets
their name (and taste) from the mites : "la tomme céronnée" is so called
because it's covered with "cirons" (mites) that gives it its typical nutty
taste (you're of course supposed to eat the rind, eventually after brushing
off some of the dust).

Another interesting thing to now is that raw milk cheeses have an intense life
of their own, but they're less susceptible to host bad bugs : the existing
fauna and flora keeps the nasty ones out. OTOH, a pasteurized cheese must be
either almost sterile, or may rapidly host all sorts of bad microbes.

~~~
omginternets
>eventually

Fellow compatriot spotted ;)

Just FYI, “eventually” != “éventuellement”.

Also, do you want to tell them about Corsican cheese, or should I?

~~~
tasogare
Isn’t that cheese forbidden? It’s more a meat product than diary at this
point.

~~~
freeqaz
I couldn't find this when I searched the web for it. Are you meaning Casu
marzu?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casu_marzu](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casu_marzu)

~~~
Leynos
The Wikipedia article gives a suggestion for how to kill the maggots (and
force them to vacate the cheese) if one is squeamish. The article actually
makes it sound rather delicious (if hard to obtain).

------
wcoenen
Sounds like something that could be solved with food irradiation [1] after the
cheese has ripened, to kill the mites. It's similar to pasteurization, but
without any of the heat which would melt the cheese. And it's already FDA
approved[2].

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_irradiation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_irradiation)

[2] [https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/food-
irra...](https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/food-irradiation-
what-you-need-know)

~~~
tomxor
Does it need to be solved? Is it an actual problem? I'm not clear what the
issues is with eating them.

What's the difference between mites in this cheese and bacteria in yogurt?
they are both intrinsic to the process of producing respective foods.

~~~
stevula
Many food regulations seem to be based on people’s traditional idea of
cleanliness than on actual salutary benefits. I doubt hair and cockroaches are
huge disease vectors but I still don’t want them in or near my food.

~~~
saiya-jin
Yeah but if you kill the mites/worms/whatever, its still _in_ the cheese, just
dead. I would actually prefer the, you know, meaty part, to be fresh upon
digestion

~~~
tomxor
:D well said, we want our cheese mites fresh and squirming.

------
swimfar
In Germany there is a cheese called Milbenkäse (mite cheese) that contains
live mites inside the cheese, not just on the rind. They contain hundreds of
thousands of them per cheese block.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milbenk%C3%A4se](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milbenk%C3%A4se)

~~~
kergonath
And of course that’s nothing compared to casu marzu. Granted, they are maggots
and not mites.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casu_marzu](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casu_marzu)

------
numpad0
Could anyone educate me on how to dereference and unsee this article from my
brain? I very much love cheeses and never noticed this ... fact.

~~~
distantaidenn
Don’t look up how figs are pollinated.

~~~
HeWhoLurksLate
If, like me, you also don't want to find out how figs are pollinated, here's
an article I didn't immediately turn around and find-

[https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/85340/fig-pollination-
in...](https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/85340/fig-pollination-incredible-
and-probably-results-you-eating-mummified-wasps)

------
jccooper
I had to find out what happened. Apparently after a year it came back, but why
is unclear.

[https://www.kansascity.com/living/liv-columns-blogs/chow-
tow...](https://www.kansascity.com/living/liv-columns-blogs/chow-
town/article2742471.html)

[https://www.dairyreporter.com/Article/2013/04/17/FDA-
dismiss...](https://www.dairyreporter.com/Article/2013/04/17/FDA-dismisses-
reports-of-US-import-ban-on-French-mimolette-cheese)

French raw milk cheeses are still banned, though.

~~~
swimfar
Not all raw milk cheese is banned. Raw milk cheeses that have been aged less
than 60 days are not allowed in the US and Canada(excluding Quebec). You can
buy raw milk cheese in most supermarkets in the US.

------
pmoriarty
I wonder how the FDA feels about civet coffee.

------
pbhjpbhj
Why stop the sale, if there are problems with allergies can't you just label
the cheese "[may] contain mites" under the allergen list?

Do the mites taste worse if they're dead? Seems they could be killed
relatively easily by placing then in an oxygen free container for a while?

~~~
kergonath
Cheese is often a bargaining chip in trade negotiations, or collateral damage
when the American government wants so show it’s not happy. One example was the
banana trade wars in the 1990s, which saw things like roquefort (as well as
other European food) getting banned and un-banned a couple of times. It often
has not much to do with actual food safety.

~~~
swimfar
True, but I doubt that banning this one very specific cheese (that is much
less known than Roquefort in the US) is due to trade negotiations. Even the
German mite cheese is supposedly in kind of a legal grey area in the EU.

~~~
kergonath
You’re right, in this instance apparently some customs agents did not like the
look of one batch. My memory is a bit hazy, and finding details is difficult.
The report is fantastic though, you can feel the disgust of the officer who
wrote it:

— The article is subject to refusal of admission pursuant to Section 801(a)(3)
in that it the article appears to consist in whole or in part of a filthy,
putrid, or decomposed substance or be otherwise unfit for food. —
[https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/importrefusals/index....](https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/importrefusals/index.cfm)

There are actually a bunch of things that are not entirely compliant with EU
regulations but get some kind of exemption because they are traditional, and
usually not produced in large quantities. Sometimes they can be produced but
not sold, like the casu marzu mentioned elsethread.

------
Animats
Just irradiate it. Problem solved.

------
slater
(2013)

~~~
Vlad81b
let me remove this. sorry

~~~
hadrien01
Why remove it? It's interesting!

