Dairy products
In the Netherlands we eat lots of dairy products, for example: cheese, butter and vla (custard) to name a few. Each citizen eats roughly about 120 kilograms of dairy products per year. For a country with around 18 million citizens, that’s a lot!
History of Cheese
In early history, the Netherlands already made cheese. The west part of the country is the most suitable for keeping dairy cattle due to the wet soil.
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Cheese was already being made early. Earthenware pots from this period have been found with holes in them in which the curd could drain and dry.
The Roman emperor Julius Caesar had written about cheese eating Germans, in his book ‘De bello Gallico’.
During the Middle Ages, the Netherlands already exported cheese abroad. Therefore it was known as cheese country.
Cheese was mainly made in the provinces of North and South Holland and Friesland because they are most suitable for keeping dairy cattle due to the wet soil.
The dairy industry grew exponentially. With around 500 dairy factories at the end of this time period. These produces an tremendous about of 660 million kilograms of cheese each year, of which around 500 million kilograms were exported abroad.
