BellaOnline Forums Travel and Culture Polish Culture Polish Cheese

Well, in fact some of them are expensive imitations. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

I have never been to the United States and so I have never tried north-american cheese. But those single-packaged inventions have been around roughly since the middle ninetees.

Of course everybody had to try them out. How they look like and how they taste, it still seems very sterile and "clean" when compared to anything else that one could spot out there. They tasted and looked exactly like "melted cheese" ("serek topiony" = spread cheese) but were sliced and packaged. They're good when you're picknicking or travelling and have to make some sandwitches (a popular thing over here because it's much much cheaper than buying things on the road).

But then the normal "yellow cheese" also had to be sliced and packaged individually. Unfortunately, it looks much worse, it's often already dried out even before opening... Well, Polish companies still have much to learn (but then, it's much much cheaper!).

Ah, dried out yellow cheese is more yellow, sweating (wet on it's edges) but dry inside. (What a detailed description, I'm drifting far away from the Polish culture theme, but maybe this could bring some of our "gray reality".)


BTW. Do you remember "serki topione" (spread cheeses)? I'm not talking about Hochland, KRAFT or any other of those new capitalist inventions <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> They're still around at shops, just harder to get.

Did you prefer t&#322;uste (fat) or kremowe (creamy)? Actually, t&#322;uste had less fat (40%) than kremowe (60%). Me, I favoured t&#322;uste as they were stiffer <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> And also these were the only ones when I was a child.

I have found a web site of some collectioner of labels for the cheese: <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

http://www.republika.pl/etykiety/

What's particularly interesting about cheese spreads is that even though there are now mostly foreign brands in Poland, they usually come in many more flavors than in the West. Things like ham, paprika, or mushroom cheese spreads are almost unknown there.
Take the French brand, La Vache qui rit for example. It comes in only one, basic flavor, as far as I know. The same for the British version, the Laughing Cow. But in Poland, where it is sold as Kr�wka &#346;mieszka, it has quite a few different flavors.