Russian Cheeses

Russian cheeses are largely modelled on those of other countries, or have been developed on parallel lines.

The first cheeses to be imported into Russia on a substantial scale were Dutch ones, in the 18th century. The popularity of this type of cheese has been maintained ever since. In the 19th century wealthy Russians imported the English hard cheeses (Cheshire, Chester) which joined Dutch cheeses as a luxury on the zakuski table. As Lesley Chamberlain (1983) points out, the Russians never followed either the French practice of eating these matured cheeses as the penultimate course of dinner or the English way of eating them at the end of the meal.