Americans can make gruyère if they want to – HotAir

I had no idea this was a years-long battle, but ‘t’would seem so.

A little cheesy history lesson is in order first. Dating from 1115, Gruyère has been made in different cantons (or member states) of the Swiss confederation.

Gruyère; German: Greyerzer) is a hard Swiss cheese that originated in the cantons of Fribourg, Vaud, Neuchâtel, Jura, and Berne in Switzerland. It is named after the town of Gruyères in Fribourg…

Gruyère is classified as a Swiss-type or Alpine cheese and is sweet but slightly salty, with a flavour that varies widely with age. It is often described as creamy and nutty when young, becoming more assertive, earthy, and complex as it matures. When fully aged (five months to a year), it tends to have small cracks that impart a slightly grainy texture. Unlike Emmental, with which it is often confused, modern Gruyère has few if any eyes, although in the 19th century, this was not always the case.[further explanation needed] It is the most popular Swiss cheese in Switzerland, and in most of Europe.

It’s considered the king of any one of a number of different Swiss-style cheeses that have become hugely popular worldwide.

Took the Swiss a little bit to get on the stick, but, finally, in 2001, they gave it an appellation designation, such as many French and Italian comestible and wines already enjoy.

…In 2001, Gruyère gained the Appellation d’origine contrôlée (now designated Appellation d’origine protégée) status. Since then, the production and the maturation have been strictly defined, and all Swiss Gruyère producers must follow these rules.

I’m guessing they thought changing the rules for their production and marketplace was going to work for everyone, but that’s not how international commerce rolls. In 2015, the Swiss had apparently had enough of our apparently lawless and miserable imitations of their now highly regulated dairy product. So they and French producers sued, in an effort to restrict the use of Gruyère to a mark from those two regions alone.

The first blow came from the U.S. Patent and Trade Mark Office, which said consumers have been buying gruyère for literally decades from any number of countries.

…This includes cheese from the US, Netherlands, Germany or Austria, it said.

It upheld a ruling made by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), which rejected a claim by two groups representing cheese producers from Switzerland and France for a mark that would restrict the use of “gruyere” to cheese from Gruyère itself.

Appealing that decision, the French and Swiss restrictionistas were no more successful with the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday. The judge in the case agreed with the USPTO that all these years of availability make the term itself pretty generic for a type of cheese, not an area of origin. So, no. The Europeans don’t get to change the rules mid-stream…after 900 years.

…”Cheese – regardless of its location of production – has been labelled and sold as gruyere in America for decades,” the Richmond, Virginia-based 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Friday.

…The court said the French and Swiss groups “cannot overcome what the record makes clear: cheese consumers in the United States understand ‘GRUYERE’ to refer to a type of cheese, which renders the term generic”.

He even added insult to injury with an atrocious pun. I hope this doesn’t set relations back wit…oh, never mind.

…”Like a fine cheese, this case has matured and is ripe for our review,” Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Roger Gregory wrote on Friday for a unanimous three-judge panel that affirmed the decision.

It’s the French and Swiss. Pfft. Who cares?

In the meantime, the USDA is, like, “YO! We got standards, ya know!”

…The US Food and Drug Administration does have some standards that need to be met to call cheese “gruyere” – it must have “small holes” and have been aged for at least 90 days.

Yeah. STANDARDS. Take that.

I don’t know if it’s karma or not for being such Johnny-come-lately snooty toots, but a whole lot of their Swiss cheese just took a helluva grilling…

Firefighters in the Swiss canton of Freiburg put out the last embers of a warehouse fire Friday but not after it had destroyed the building and the 12,000 wheels of Gruyere cheese inside.

Authorities say the fire broke out in the storage basement of a 5,575 square meter (60,000 square foot) warehouse in Vuisternens-en-Ogoz — roughly 50 kilometers (31 miles) southwest of Bern — Thursday before spreading to engulf the entire facility.

Witnesses claimed hearing explosions as a large cloud of smoke blanketed the area, traffic was rerouted and water service was interrupted into Friday as small fires inaccessible to firemen due to a collapsed roof, continued to burn.

Maybe they should just mind their own cheese and q’s for a while.

Or maybe they just need more cowbell.