Hey, you gotta smell this!

In My Humble Opinion
1

So here’s a story of something I imagine might have happened some time back :

“Bob, hey Bob! Come in and check this out, man!”
“What is it, Claude?”
“My new batch of cheese! Come on, you gotta try this!”
Bob is walking up to Claude’s door. “You got a new batch of cheese there? How’d it come – Oh, geez, Claude, what’s that smell? Smells like a goat pissed all over your floor!”
“No, man, that’s my cheese. Down here, let me get some for you.”
Bob calls down to the cellar : “Uh, Claude, you may make some good cheese and all, but I think something’s definitely gone wrong with this batch. You should seriously consider throwing it out.”
Claude returns with a chunk of brownish, foul-smelling … cheese. “No, Bob, you gotta try it! Really!”
“That has got to be the worst-smelling thing ever. Get it out of here.”
“Here, just taste it.” Claude cuts the chunk, revealing a creamy, normal-looking cheese beneath. He takes a bit on his finger, and then eats it. “It’s pretty good.”
And now Bob is strangely tempted to try it. The pungent odor makes it hard to think, and now he is seriously thinking that if Claude can eat it, it can’t be horrible. The smell presses on him and he smears off a bit of the stuff and tries it.
“Well, this isn’t that bad, tastes like cheese, I guess. But that smell … are you sure you want to keep this stuff? Oh, this has a piss-flavored aftertaste! Get some wine, quick!”
Claude gets some wine to wash down the cheese, and asks, “Come on, didn’t you like it just a little bit? You tried it, didn’t you?”
“Well, it does taste like cheese, but really, Claude, you’ve made much better. Why don’t you just let this one go and start over?”
“Heck, I’ve got 40 pounds of the stuff downstairs. It doesn’t taste that bad, I don’t want to throw it out entirely.”
Just then, they see Farmer Bernie come up to Claude’s house.
“Hey, Claude, you got any more of that stinky stuff? I gotta take some home to my wife! She’ll never believe how bad it smells if I don’t bring some home!”
It suddenly dawns on Claude what to do with his cheese. News of the worst-smelling cheese in the world spreads quickly, and soon all Europe had heard of the little province of Limbourg.
(/story)

So, do you think something like this actually happened?
The cheese was preserved just because it smells so bad?

I tried Limburger cheese just the other day for the first time, and was amazed at the horrendous smell. Still, I had to taste it before I threw it out. And it wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t that much better than any other creamy cheese.
Seems to me we only have it around as a reference to foul-smelling things.
Any agreement/disagreement? Any other stuff you think is only popular because it stinks so bad (like the Boogie Bass)?

panama jack

2

I would not classify as an “it”, and I sure as hell won;t vouch for the taste, but Bratman007 sure fits the bill otherwise :smiley:

But seriously folks, that’s a good question. Perhaps said dairyman, in a fit of cheeselust, accidentally found out that the limburger actually went well with something?

My favorite burger right now has mushrooms, bacon, and gorgonzola cheese on it. Normally, I’ll turn my nose so far up at gorgonzola that my neck cracks. However, in this combination, I can’t think of a better cheese to have.

3

WAG here: In earlier, more primitive eras, people couldn’t afford to waste potential nutrition, no matter how bad it smelled or tasted. You can get used to anything, if it keeps you alive.

4

Limburger, while certainly strong smelling, I;ve never found to be * bad * smelling. But then again, I like very strong smelling foods…

5

Whoa. Limburger smells awful.

However, I’ve found its taste to be surprisingly good, particularly when melted (and past one’s nose). IMHO, don’t turn your nose up at Limburger until you’ve tasted it. Hold your nose? That’s another story.

6

DDG : I think you’re right, most likely they did eat it when they made it, I just didn’t see how it came to be something they would cultivate. I’ve eaten a lot of stuff I’ve made that tastes awful but I have nothing else to eat.

(Story that’s mildly related to repellant foods : I went to a local market that sells fresh fish real cheap. First time I’d been there. They’ve got a lot of whole fish just lying out, and I see other people picking them and getting them cleaned, so I pick two catfish and wait while the guy cleans them. No sooner is he done then he throws them into what I’d thought was a large sink but turns out to be a tub of boiling oil. Yep, fried them whole right out. I could no longer object, since they half-cooked once they were in, so I took the box home. I couldn’t quite get why they cooked them whole, seems they only did that to catfish. (The market is Filipino and communication was difficult for me. I got home and had no choice but dump some sauce on them and eat 'em up. The sauce didn’t help much.)

I do think Limburger tastes good, but I don’t find it particularly wonderful compared to other cheeses that don’t smell so bad.

jayron showed me that some people don’t mind the smell, so maybe it made it to the present day for some other reason than as an olfactory curiousity.

And Mr. Cynical, you might have a point, too. When searching for info on how Limburger’s made, somewhere along the way I found a message from a guy who said the best sandwich he’d ever had was a sardine, limburger and onions in Las Vegas.
Strange if true, but it could happen.

panama jack.