In between drinking Prosecco and showing us photos of all the cats she’s ever owned, my 73-year-old Swiss neighbor announced rather triumphantly, “Ich liebe Kartoffeln!” (I love potatoes).
My American husband and I smiled politely as she went on to tell us how she eats potatoes at least once a day and has a traditional raclette dinner (that includes, what else, potatoes) every Saturday night.
Then, in the middle of the description of her daily sausage salad - complete with potatoes of course - I started thinking about my own experience with Swiss food.
For months, my husband had asked me, “Have you tried it yet?”
Of course, until I drank it, he would not reveal its ingredients and I have to admit, it wasn’t bad. Take away the brown tinted bottle and it might actually grow on me. That is, until I found out the truth.
“Rivella is made from what?” I exclaimed.
Whey.
Whoa. Whey? I wasn’t even sure what that was.
Then I toured the cheese factory in Gruyères and found out that whey is just what drips off cheese and should rightfully be put in the garbage.
After all, if cheese deems whey not worthy, why should I? But the Swiss, never prepared to waste anything not to mention always looking for another way to make money, crafted a drink made from-when you get right down to it-nothing other than cheese excrement.
Naturally, I was biased against this drink. Perhaps if it had been poured into a clear glass with twenty ice cubes I might have been convinced. But as any expat living in Switzerland knows, ice is not easy to come by.
“Ice. You know, ice?” I try to explain to my Swiss waiter.
Two years after my first run-in with Rivella, lukewarm drinks made with milk plasma are no longer strange to me, but one thing still is: Quark. It’s been many things in my cooking, but after asking around, I still cannot get a straight answer about exactly what it is.
Is it cream cheese? No.
Is it sour cream? No.
Is it cottage cheese? No.
“It’s kind of like what’s in cheesecake,” my Swiss friend, Tom, tried to explain, “You can cook desserts with it.”
Then I mentioned I had used Quark in my potato soup during the period when I was convinced it was sour cream. Tom wrinkled his nose in disgust.
But I bet my neighbor would have eaten it.
Tags: beverages, food, Life in Switzerland, Rivella, Swiss
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Hi, see wikipedia’s article about Quark, I think its the best explanation you can find…: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_(cheese)
Fun post for sure…. I have yet to try Rivella, after living in Zurich for 6 months. Um, I don’t it’s this post that’s going to do it, ha ha! Actually… I am quite curious! As for Quark, I’m a big fan. I buy that or Sere and treat it as extra thick Greek yogurt - pour honey over it and throw in some dried fruit or nuts. Or swirl in some fruit jam instead. It’s delish, and I have it as an afternoon snack all the time. Try it !! At least there’s no whey in it …..!
Quark is simply fresh cheese, a basis of cheese. Or if you will, a cheese at an early process before it starts smelling… It’s somewhat similar to the indian panir or the italian ricotta. But I won’t discuss dairy, fermented products or even raw milk with an American woman
I’ll agree that Rivella’s weird. But hey, whey’s very nutricious. It has a lot a minerals and vitamins and is also used to extract proteins for sports food… it cannot be that bad. If you don’t think of is as “cheese excrements”…
I really really really dislike Rivella. But if I had to choose, the green one is the best. But still, I’ll stick with my coke zero!
Kerrin > Séré is french for Quark.
I prefer the on-label explanation of Rivella… milk serum.. it sounds technology advanced… rather than “cheese excrement” hehehehehehe… Rivella is actually not too bad… and I think they have another… green-labelled which is made from soy bean serum… is that “soy bean excrement” too?? hehehhe
I think in Rivella’s case, they should disguise the ingredients in the beverage rather than advertise them. Because if you just drink it, it tastes ok. But then you find out what’s in it and rethink your consumption.
Being Polish living in Switzerland, I have to admit that it is not possible to compare Swiss Quark with Polish Twarog. I have recently learned that they both belong to the same family of crude cheeses, yet you cannot bake real Sernik (roughly translated as “Cheese Cake”) with it. Regarding Rivella, well, this new with soy is really disgusting. The standard one reminds me my childhood when I used to raw whey for lunch - especially in the Summer time. Here disgusting part for those faint-hearted: my grandma used to keep fresh milk (not pasteurized or UHT) few days outside the fridge to let it ferment. It was so delicious. There is no chance to do it from this hi-tech milk today.
I just wanted to say how much you are making me laugh. I really enjoy your blog, I lived near Lausanne for over 6 years with my Swiss husband and I thought so many times of writing a blog on all the weird stuff we come across as Americans living in Switzerland. It’s all so comical when you’re telling other people about it.
I cannot believe how ignorant you are to say that whey is a waste and that you are scared to drink it. Whey contains milk protein and vitamins which are easy to digest. In other words, it is healthy! What healthy stuff does your American coke contain? I stopped drinking coke for many years, when I realised that it’s cheaper than bottle water… Because bottle water contains water of better quality obviously than the water used for coke. Aren’t you disgusted to drink it?
Two things. First bottled water has been shown to be of no higher quality than ordinary US tap water. In fact, many brands of bottled water are actually the base for soda produced by coke, pepsi, etc without adding the syrup and carbonation. Second, whey is often used to produce protein powder, which is frequently used worldwide.
Rivella of course! How can a post on Swiss food not talk about rivella? I personally have acquired a taste to the blue one. BTW, Happy Swiss National Day. I just posted some pictures of the Swiss National Day bread with those cute Swiss flags here ..check these out
http://snacksgiving.blogspot.com/2009/08/happy-swiss-national-day.html
Try to drink Fanta, then. NPR was just now (8/9/10) telling the Fanta story. A Rivella like drink created from “waste” in the last years of Nazi Germany. Full of nutrients it was used to make soups. When my kefir cultures fail, separating in quark and whey, I don’t discard the whey but I use it to replace some of the liquid ingredients in cakes or breads. Since you are appreciating the Swiss food, you should write about the “tripe” sold at the butcher’s: bovine stomach, “menudo” in the Mexican cuisine of Arizona. BTW, is the carbonation in Rivella originating from the miilk fermentation or added from global warming emissions? And aren’t yogourt and cheese made from “rotten” milk?
I have lived in switzerland for nearly three years. The food here is mainly S**T.
The restaurants are hit and miss - usually miss. Very backwards here.