Everyone knows that sweet dreams are made of cheese, and aged cheese is what all sophisticated types eat while wine tasting in northern Italy. But how long would you let your cheese age before kindly declining a bite? The older the better, no?
Scientists recently confirmed that an unidentified substance found in an Egyptian tomb was none-other-than the world's oldest block of cheese; 3,200 years old, to be exact.
The "solidified whitish mass" was found by archeologists a couple years ago in the tomb of Ptahmes, a high-ranking Egyptian official in 13th century B.C. and the former mayor of the ancient city of Memphis. Since no proof of cheese production has been found in Ancient Egypt before, this discovery is highly significant. Finally, some proof that the Egyptians of yesteryear liked to get their cheddar on!
"The material analysed [sic] is probably the most ancient archaeological solid residue of cheese ever found to date," Dr. Enrico Greco of the University of Catania, who worked with the Cairo University in Egypt to examine the cheese, told BBC. "We know it was made mostly from sheep's and goat's milk, but for me it's really hard to imagine a specific flavour."
If you like your cheese with some bite, you're in luck. Apparently the ancient dairy product would be “really, really acidy,” Paul Kindstedt, a professor at the University of Vermont, told the New York Times. “It would be high in moisture; it would be spreadable. It would not last long; it would spoil very quickly.”
Sooooo that means we can eat it then, yes? Someone pass me the crackers.