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Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

foodandwine.com

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Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#271

Post by yreg »

perihelions wrote: post #225
axg11 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think any chip would be harmful to ingest? You could happily eat most chips, if they were small enough, without any negative effects.

There's some hideously toxic metals in certain semiconductors, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium_arsenide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadmium_telluride

I'd expect the mass of these metals that can be used in a 0.5mm chip to be negligible. Still, I don't like the idea of a future where these chips are used in many food items.

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#272

Post by kristjankalm »

capableweb wrote: post #269
noipv4 wrote: post #264

Here's picture of p-Chip. https://p-chip.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/pChip-tracking... I do not want these in my diet though.

I don't know about you, but I generally don't eat the rind of aged/hardened cheese, so that's not really a problem (for me).

I regularly use parmigiano rind when making vegetable stock. Hopefully the tracker extract will add some nuance.

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#273

Post by yreg »

Nullabillity wrote: post #262
morelisp wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To get a DPO registration you must show both historical ties to the region and a specific regional method. There is a quality control board. Probably some of it is puffery; some of it is quite precise. https://www.parmigianoreggiano.com/consortium-specifications...

Ok, so why does the region matter, iff you follow the same method and live up to the same quality standards?

It's up to the buyers to say whether it matters and they say it does.

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#274

Post by HelloNurse »

pacbard wrote: post #15

I'm curious to know which cheesemakers are using these chips. If you look at a wheel of Parmigiano (a whole one), you will see a number stamped on it. That's the cheesemaker's matriculation number in the consortium. There are 313 active ones right now. Some of them are very big (especially the ones in the lowlands) and some of them are very small (mostly the ones up in the hills). The small cheesemakers have trouble…

Embedding these chips is neither difficult nor expensively high-tech, and verification isn't performed by the cheesemaker: why shouldn't small establishments participate in the program?

On an overseas store shelf the alternative is between real Parmigiano-Reggiano (if the experimentation is successful, with a chip) and counterfeit shit, not between different cheesemakers of the consortium (who, if they care, adopt their own trademarks and branding for particularly good cheese at premium prices).

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#275

Post by eginhard »

denton-scratch wrote: post #99
qalmakka wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comté tastes similar, but it's still different than Gruyère IMHO.

Until 1976, I had never heard of Comté; they sold that cheese as Gruyére, even though it was made in France. In that year, the AOC regulations came fully into force, and it became illegal to sell cheese made in France as Gruyére. There are many regional variations and qualities of Comté, too. When De Gaulle asked "How can you govern a country with 200 different cheeses", he was underestimating badly.

French Gruyère now has AOC status as well, but it must have holes to distinguish it from the Swiss one: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gruy%C3%A8re_fran%C3%A7ais

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#276

Post by morelisp »

Nullabillity wrote: post #262
morelisp wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To get a DPO registration you must show both historical ties to the region and a specific regional method. There is a quality control board. Probably some of it is puffery; some of it is quite precise. https://www.parmigianoreggiano.com/consortium-specifications...

Ok, so why does the region matter, iff you follow the same method and live up to the same quality standards?

> iff you follow the same method

Good luck competing in any economical sense if you're importing cows from Parma to give them uncontaminated feed from Parma then aging the cheese in an artificial climate like Parma's.

Corners are invariably cut. Do they matter? Maybe, maybe not. But why do you need to name your cheese after a region it's not from? Grana padano's done fine for itself, for example.

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#277

Post by np_tedious »

capableweb wrote: post #269
noipv4 wrote: post #264

Here's picture of p-Chip. https://p-chip.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/pChip-tracking... I do not want these in my diet though.

I don't know about you, but I generally don't eat the rind of aged/hardened cheese, so that's not really a problem (for me).

It's not a bad thing to let a dog chew on.... until now

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#278

Post by rossvor »

firstcommentyo wrote: post #251
puszczyk wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I enjoyed reading The Verge by P. Wyman https://www.amazon.com/Verge-Reformation-Renaissance-Forty-Y... It describes changes that happened in war, mining, shipping, trade in (mostly western) Europe in the last decades of XV century. The common theme is finance and it includes a chapter on how bank houses became bigger and could secure much bigger loans (which allowed bigger states to wage wars, or rich individuals to…

Welcome to MMXXII. About X centuries ago "we" imported the Hindu-Arabic numerals. I know, Latin numbers carry the myth of being more "safe" but really you should try the arabian numerals. They revolutionized math and eased reading text alongside. thumbs-up

It's a convention to use roman numerals for centuries in some european countries. Parent poster probably just done it out of habit.

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#279

Post by np_tedious »

djur wrote: post #123
ace2358 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canned tomatoes? Yikes. If you’re trying to beat premise sauces at least get some local fresh tomatoes and have a go and making it from scratch. The acidic flavour of canned tomatoes is horrible in my opinion compared to fresh tomatoes.

For the ~1 month I have access to local fresh tomatoes, I'm going to be eating them in fresh preparations like caprese salad, BLTs, etc. rather than using them on sauces. The remaining 11 months of the year, canned tomatoes are just fine.

I think this is a smart move. Your examples are cases where fresh tomatoes outperform canned. Sauces, not so much

Re: Parmigiano Reggiano makers embedding tiny trackers in rind to fight cheese fraud

#280

Post by [deleted] »

dsco wrote: post #261
henearkr wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That confirms something I suspected: blockchain adds nothing to this solution, and is present only because of the fad.

Where does it say anything about blockchains in the article and how often do you think about how much you hate them?

[deleted]
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