gordonzola (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
gordonzola) wrote2006-08-08 09:12 am
gordonzola) wrote2006-08-08 09:12 am
Entry tags:
Cheese Conference: keynote
This is the last year I share a bed at the conference to save money, I’m just too old for it. I hardly slept at all before the first day’s events and it wasn’t for any reason your collective dirty minds can dredge up. Plus we had that first night thermostat thing where the room went from unbearably hot then freezing cold. Urgh.
Once again I attended the conference with my cheese travel buddy Sheana and her sister. Those are the folks I was drinking beer with in yesterday’s entry. We have traveled well over the years but after a day of cheese-eating, beer tasting, and schmoozing, having a little of my own space would have been nice. Yes, I should have known this in advance.
So I walked in, bleary, cranky and sleep-deprived, to the biggest American Cheese Society conference in history. It sold out for the first time ever with nearly 800 cheese folks. The first conference I attended was a much more intimate event. Even though there are people who’ve been attending for a decade or two, I was approached more than once by folks looking for other "old-timers". I refused to accept that title, it doesn’t seem appropriate in an industry that is often multi-generational, but it does show how popular cheese has gotten in the last few years.
Juliet Harbutt started off with a keynote on "Exploring Cheese Frontiers" which addressed this increased profile of our trade. She’s been in the cheese world a long time, and shared a lot of her experiences from the early days when there was less of a demand for artisianal cheese. And indeed, in her own store she single-handedly helped some cheesemakers from quitting the business back when the term "hand-made" was more of a liability than an asset.
I also loved her story about being called disgusting by a customer when she was selling Welsh cheeses but as a retailer I did see the punchline coming a mile away. If only someone thinking cheese from Wales was really "cheese from whales" was the most absurd thing I’ve heard…
(Edit: ok, I didn't realize how long that was. I'm cutting off part and posting it tomorrow)
Once again I attended the conference with my cheese travel buddy Sheana and her sister. Those are the folks I was drinking beer with in yesterday’s entry. We have traveled well over the years but after a day of cheese-eating, beer tasting, and schmoozing, having a little of my own space would have been nice. Yes, I should have known this in advance.
So I walked in, bleary, cranky and sleep-deprived, to the biggest American Cheese Society conference in history. It sold out for the first time ever with nearly 800 cheese folks. The first conference I attended was a much more intimate event. Even though there are people who’ve been attending for a decade or two, I was approached more than once by folks looking for other "old-timers". I refused to accept that title, it doesn’t seem appropriate in an industry that is often multi-generational, but it does show how popular cheese has gotten in the last few years.
Juliet Harbutt started off with a keynote on "Exploring Cheese Frontiers" which addressed this increased profile of our trade. She’s been in the cheese world a long time, and shared a lot of her experiences from the early days when there was less of a demand for artisianal cheese. And indeed, in her own store she single-handedly helped some cheesemakers from quitting the business back when the term "hand-made" was more of a liability than an asset.
I also loved her story about being called disgusting by a customer when she was selling Welsh cheeses but as a retailer I did see the punchline coming a mile away. If only someone thinking cheese from Wales was really "cheese from whales" was the most absurd thing I’ve heard…
(Edit: ok, I didn't realize how long that was. I'm cutting off part and posting it tomorrow)