North Bay Bohemian

Page 13

3<<1 1?6;8

A4 >A84=C43 Mark Todd (right) and his friend and assistant Chef Leon from the Hotel Intercontinental.

<TTc cWT 2WTTbT 3dST Mark Todd is on a mission to bring dairy to Asia By Alastair Bland

0

s though makers of artisan cheese in California did not have a sure enough foothold in the culinary marketplace, now the industry is looking to push its products into the cheese-less wilderness of Asia, and they’ve hired just the man to do it: the Cheese Dude. Otherwise known as Mark Todd, the 49-yearold Monte Rio dairy consultant makes a living promoting and consulting for the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board, the U.S. Dairy Export Council, the California Milk Advisory Board and a smattering of smaller enterprises. Todd’s main focus—and the passion of his life—is teaching people to enjoy the pleasures of eating cheese with beer and wine. Much of Todd’s writing appears on BeyondWonderful.com, an educational food and drink forum, but as the Cheese Dude, he regularly takes his job on the road, and in early May he returned from a two-week tour

of Asia hosted by the California Milk Advisory Board. The journey, Todd’s third voyage to the Far East in two years, led the Dude and three other marketing specialists into the populated centers of Ho Chi Minh City and Jakarta, where the team visited hotels, culinary schools and restaurants to conduct cheese and wine tastings and lead chefs through pizza-making seminars. Pizza, says Todd, literally serves as an efficient vehicle for delivering cheese to the table in cultures that have never taken dairy production beyond the milk stage. Cheese-making is believed to have begun about 7,500 years ago in the Middle East, and the tradition migrated westward. A genetic mutation that allowed humans to digest lactose beyond infancy followed, and today in northern Europe some 80 percent of the population can pass cheese through their systems almost as smoothly as whole kernel corn. About 40 percent of southern Europeans are lactose tolerant, and in northern Africa, 10 percent of the population can easily digest dairy. But in Asia, the mutation is less prevalent.

As for cheese itself, the average American eats some 30 pounds of cheese every year. The average Greek, about 60 pounds per year, more than in any other nation. But the average Chinese citizen—of which there are approximately 1.5 billion—eats no cheese at all. “If China went from zero to just half a pound per year—you do the math,� says Todd, who notes that the California dairy market is in a position to profit since most of Asia does not have the available land to produce cheese. “If you have a product that can ship across the world, then it behooves you to get in on a market that makes up nearly one-fourth of the world’s population.� Todd traveled the Asian tropics on his latest tour with a crusty, smelly cargo from a multitude of California dairies, including Bravo Farms, Marin French Cheese Company, Point Reyes Farmstead, Sierra Nevada Cheese Company, Rumiano Cheese, Three Sisters and Fiscalini. At evening receptions at each location that they visited, Todd and his men featured tasting tables spread with a wide array of cheeses, California wines and Asian lagers. Guests were &) THE BOHEMIAN

05.27.09-06.02.09

13

Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.