Event: 9000 Years of Cheese

Monday, May 28 2012

Event: 9000 Years of Cheese

This looks to be a really interesting event. Dr. Paul Kindstedt was one of my instructors during my four-day class at VIAC and is an engaging and entertaining public speaker, as well as being someone who really knows his cheese history. Needless to say, if you haven’t bought his book yet, get to it!

9000 Years of Cheese: Fermenting Religion, Climate Change, and the Environment

Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden, New York, NY (Map)

“9000 Years of Cheese: Fermenting Religion, Climate Change, and the Environment”

with Paul Kindstedt

Thursday, May 31, 2012 | Tickets
6:30 pm Check-in and reception | 7:00 pm Lecture
$25 CHNY and MVMH Members | $22 CHNY and MVMH Senior & Student Members | $40 Non-Members and Guests

Weaving together archeology, anthropology, linguistics, and geography, Paul Kindstedt’s new book, Cheese and Culture: A History of Cheese and its Place in Western Culture, shows how this extraordinary cultural comestible has influenced and enriched humankind. Paul’s lecture will focus on three factors that profoundly shaped the history of cheese: human spirituality, global climate change, and environmental degradation.

Cheese was part of the religious history of western civilization, starting in the Mesopotamian “cradle of civilization.” Yet climate changes and environmental degradation, already occurring in the 4th millennium BCE, pushed cheese making into new directions and set Europe on a track to become the cheese making powerhouse of the world. Cheese making’s rich and luscious history, from Neolithic cultures through ancient Rome, medieval Holland, and modern America, will be showcased in a reception featuring artisanal cheeses and cheese recipes.

Paul Kindstedt is a Professor of Food Science at the University of Vermont, and Co-Director of the Vermont Institute for Artisan Cheese. Author, with the Vermont Cheese Council, of American Farmstead Cheese (2005), he is a nationally recognized expert on dairy chemistry, cheese science, and cheese making.

Location:

Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden (Map)
417 East 61st Street (between 1st Avenue and York)
New York, New York 10065