Cheese & Chinese Cuisine?

[EdS]

The symptoms appear and become more severe depending on the quantity of lactose consumed. Some people who are lactose intolerant avoid all milk products simply because they don't want to take the risk. Others, like myself, know they can have some amount before there are any symptoms or the symptoms become too much and thus will moderate their intake. Being lactose intolerant means one doesn't produce the lactase enzyme needed to digest lactose. A substantial majority of people in the world no longer produce lactase by adulthood. The exception would typically be people with ancestry in parts of Europe, the Middle East, India, and parts of Africa where milk has been historically consumed. Lactose intolerance is the norm not the exception. It just happens that most people in the U.S. have ancestors from milk-producing parts of the world.

By the way, there is very little lactose in aged cheese. I eat it freely.

Information at the National Digestive Diseases Information Clearinghouse

Edited March 23, 2006 by esvoboda (log)

[jo-mel]

I've read 90% also. But that same source said that lactose intolerance didn't stop the dairy raising border areas of China from consuming milk products. Weren't those products quite common when China was ruled by nomadic invaders, and when they were gone, dairy was shunned because of the association with those invaders?

I guess, that milk products never really caught on because of land use for cattle, and the need was not there when you had soybean products.

[ecr]

My first taste of goat cheese was in Kunming, 20+ years ago. Not a tourist restaurant, just a wok-in-a-garage type place. I ordered it bec. I was curious (goat cheese not being too common in the American midwest back then). It was slightly aged, sliced into wedges, and pan(wok)-fried till lightly browned. Tasty but goat-y. The owner-cook and his wife were Han Chinese, not minorities.

So yes, some "true" Chinese do eat cheese. And have been doing so since before Kraft came on the scene.

[miladyinsanity]

Being lactose intolerant means one doesn't produce the lactase enzyme needed to digest lactose. A substantial majority of people in the world no longer produce lactase by adulthood. The exception would typically be people with ancestry in parts of Europe, the Middle East, India, and parts of Africa where milk has been historically consumed. Lactose intolerance is the norm not the exception. It just happens that most people in the U.S. have ancestors from milk-producing parts of the world.

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I've also heard that drinking low-fat milk can lead to lactose intolerance in adulthood.

[jo-mel]

My first taste of goat cheese was in Kunming, 20+ years ago. Not a tourist restaurant, just a wok-in-a-garage type place. I ordered it bec. I was curious (goat cheese not being too common in the American midwest back then). It was slightly aged, sliced into wedges, and pan(wok)-fried till lightly browned. Tasty but goat-y. The owner-cook and his wife were Han Chinese, not minorities.

So yes, some "true" Chinese do eat cheese. And have been doing so since before Kraft came on the scene.

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Yunnan seems to be that one Chinese province that has kept alive the Mongol influence and the interchanges with bordering Tibet. Interesting, tho, that the cooks were Han Chinese.

[Kent Wang]

My first taste of goat cheese was in Kunming, 20+ years ago. Not a tourist restaurant, just a wok-in-a-garage type place. I ordered it bec. I was curious (goat cheese not being too common in the American midwest back then). It was slightly aged, sliced into wedges, and pan(wok)-fried till lightly browned. Tasty but goat-y. The owner-cook and his wife were Han Chinese, not minorities.

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Was it similar or very different from Western goat cheese?

[ecr]

It was the first time I'd ever had goat cheese, period, so at the time I didn't have anything to compare it with. Looking back, it was somewhat similar to an aged (dry) French goat cheese --- very strong flavor. I was slightly repelled but liked it at the same time .... the same way one can be with shrimp paste.

Beyond Mongol and Tibetan influence, Central Asians brought by the Mongols to subdue Yunnan settled and stayed afterwards .... perhaps the presence of cheese in the province is connected to that as well.

[stephenc]

Lactose intolerance usually is genetic (inherited). In many people of African or Asian descent, the body begins making less lactase around age 5. As many as 90% of Asian-Americans, 80 percent of American Indians, 65% of African-Americans and 50% of Hispanics have some degree of lactose intolerance. In contrast, most Caucasians (80%) have a gene that preserves the ability to produce lactase into adulthood.

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As an Asian-American, I have seen WAY too many of my friends and relatives eating ice-cream, putting cream in their coffee, eating cheeseburgers and pizza, putting milk in their cereal, or just straight up drinking milk for that figure to be correct. 50% seems like a more reasonable figure to me.

Edited March 30, 2006 by stephenc (log)

[EdS]

Lactose intolerance usually is genetic (inherited). In many people of African or Asian descent, the body begins making less lactase around age 5. As many as 90% of Asian-Americans, 80 percent of American Indians, 65% of African-Americans and 50% of Hispanics have some degree of lactose intolerance. In contrast, most Caucasians (80%) have a gene that preserves the ability to produce lactase into adulthood.

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As an Asian-American, I have seen WAY too many of my friends and relatives eating ice-cream, putting cream in their coffee, eating cheeseburgers and pizza, putting milk in their cereal, or just straight up drinking milk for that figure to be correct. 50% seems like a more reasonable figure to me.

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I do all those things too but I have to limit the quantity that's in my system at any one time. I suspect a fair number of those people you see are the same way. It's not an allergy where one mere teaspoon's going to get me sick but if I go past a certain limit, things aren't so nice. If I were to have a bowl of cereal with milk, you won't catch me having ice cream at lunch, for example.

Not to gross you out or anything, but I've run experiments to see if I really was lactose intolerant and to what extent. I've tried like one cup of milk one day, then two cups the next, etc. There's a point where a problem appears and then more will make it worse. I then repeated with that lactose-free milk and found no problem with that. My point is that it's not like people who are lactose intolerant have to avoid lactose completely.

Being part Asian and knowing too many of my Asian friends with this issue, I can't really question the 90-percent figure. If it's not that high, I'm sure it's still pretty high.

Edited March 30, 2006 by esvoboda (log)

[froggio]

Hi everyone,

my two cents:

PRC Chinese tend to prefer hard aged cheese, cooked or not, such as Comte (a big favorite), Beaufort etc.

Goat cheese and soft strong cheese are not very popular because of pungency. Blue cheese fares a bit better.

I am a partner in a cheese import and retail company in Shanghai.

[Kent Wang]

Do Chinese like freshly-grated parm? Has the Kraft fake-parm (I call it Parmesand) made in-roads?

[jokhm]

I used to here that 90% figure a lot.. but I can't imagine this being even close to possible. In the mainland the government has pushed yogurt and milk consumption so much that it is very difficult to find people under 30 years old who don't like cheese or yogurt, and in many places towards the north you can buy fresh yogurt at every little street-side minimart and phone place.

As for Pizza Hut, I'm sure I'm not the first here to mention the insane amounts of them popping up in every single city, along with the enormous line-ups that inevitably follow. Saturday nights will always show tons of well-dressed Chinese lining up for LONG time for a table. Crazy. You couldn't pay me to ever eat there again..

Another really interesting development that I've seen take place in the last 8 months or so is this newest street snack that has begun popping up all over the country, everywhere. They look like pizzas, and they are referred to as Chinese Pizzas, but are basically cheeseless flat breads covered in a fantastic spice-blend, fresh coriander, tiny bits of meat and loads of oil. They are quite good sometimes.. Obviously Pizza Hut is a turn on for many, though the Cheese is one thing that isn't very needed.

Also.. speaking of Pizza Hut, the strange thing that I always notice while walking by is that I rarely see people inside eating their pizza. Always a plate of 4 chicken wings. (??!)

[jokhm]

Oh.. last peculiarity in the mainland regarding cheese.

The other day I was in Hangzhou at the Carrefour shopping center and I picked up a large round of lait-cru 10 day old camembert for roughly US$4.50. Good price for something so authentic to be illegal in the US.

The only explanation for the relatively fantastic cheese counter at Carrefour is the fact that it is a French chain.. But still, someone must be buying this stuff besides the odd foreigner like myself.. right?

[Fengyi]

Also.. speaking of Pizza Hut, the strange thing that I always notice while walking by is that I rarely see people inside eating their pizza. Always a plate of 4 chicken wings. (??!)

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Oh no - but what about that icon of Pizza Hut Salad Bar Architecture?!?!?!

Chinese Salad Architecture

Don't tell me everyone's stopped doing it?

Or have they made the world bland and boring but allowing unlimited trips to the salad bars (oh dull, dull days...how we shall miss the towers of tomatoes, the constructions of cukes, the landmass of lettuce.....!)

[hzrt8w]

Oh no - but what about that icon of Pizza Hut Salad Bar Architecture?!?!?!

Chinese Salad Architecture

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That's some very interesting photos, Fengyi! They built a small pagoda out of cucumber bricks! How practical! Genius!

[Hest88]

I used to here that 90% figure a lot.. but I can't imagine this being even close to possible. In the mainland the government has pushed yogurt and milk consumption so much that it is very difficult to find people under 30 years old who don't like cheese or yogurt, and in many places towards the north you can buy fresh yogurt at every little street-side minimart and phone place.

It may not be 90% but I still think it's pretty high. Yogurt can often be tolerated by lactose-intolerant people because of the live bacteria.

The National Dairy Council, which has a vested interested in milk consumption, cites on their Web site at 25% of Americans and 75% of adults world-wide are lactose intolerant---figures that seem to be in line with the stats that sheetz cited above. More info from the Dairy Council site:

Some milk and milk products are better tolerated than others by lactose maldigesters. Most cheeses, especially those aged for at least six months, such as Cheddar and Swiss, contain little, if any, lactose (2,3,4). During the manufacturing of cheese, most of the lactose is removed with the whey. In addition, during the ripening or aging of cheese, most of the remaining lactose is converted to lactic acid and other by-products. Other foods that contain small amounts of lactose and that generally are well tolerated include: cottage cheese, Farmer's cheese, ricotta cheese, soft cheese (cream cheese), and commercial foods processed with small amounts of milk, milk products, milk solids, or lactose (e.g., bread and baked goods, processed breakfast cereals, lunch meats, salad dressings). Lactose maldigesters appear to tolerate chocolate milk better than unflavored milk (19,20).

...

"Live Active Cultures"

Many fermented and culture-containing milk products such as yogurt with "live active cultures" are well tolerated by lactose intolerant children and adults (21,22). The enzyme lactase, produced by starter cultures Streptococcus thermophilus and Lactobacillus bulgaricus used to ferment some milk and milk products, such as yogurt, partially hydrolyzes lactose. But improved lactose digestion is primarily due to autodigestion within the intestine by the microbial enzymes. Lactase in yogurt does not improve the digestion of lactose in other milk and milk products consumed at the same time as yogurt (23).

Yogurt with "live active cultures" is well tolerated by the majority of lactase-deficient individuals, even though yogurt's lactose content can vary widely. Because very high or low temperatures inactivate the bacteria, pasteurized yogurt and frozen yogurt are less likely than fresh yogurt to improve lactose digestion. Lactose digestion and tolerance are similar for frozen yogurt and ice cream but may be tolerated by lactose-intolerant individuals (24). Pasteurized yogurt, cultured buttermilk, and sweet acidophilus milk are tolerated at least as well as regular milk (2,3).