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I have never been to Texas but in Lockdown March I had some meat delivered from there to California as I was avoiding the supermarket, and wow, it was really great.

I would totally buy “Jamon Tejano” at Whole Paycheck.

Agreed! Also I am genuinely interested in finding out: what is the difference between “finishing” the pigs with peanuts and sunflower vs. acorns. That difference could be highlighted as an “American” take in the process. Variety is good!

> what is the difference between “finishing” the pigs with peanuts and sunflower vs. acorns

Loads of garbage PUFA.

> their propaganda reached even German TV where a supposed documentary (Galileo)

For non-Germans, Galileo has a reputation for bullshit and lies.

I read one of his biographies ("Galileo's Daughter") and I don't know where that characterization may come from, news to me (not disputing it).

He meant Galileo, the german TV series.

Galileo addressing Orazio Grassi ("Sarsi"):

> You cannot help it, Signor Sarsi, that it was granted to me alone to discover all the new phenomena in the sky and nothing to anybody else! This is the truth which neither malice nor envy can suppress!

There were plenty of people working in the field (most well-known Harriot, Marius, Fabricius, Scheiner), but Galileo does not seem to have thought much of them.

Grassi published a work on comets in 1618, and Galileo read it. We still have Galileo's copy, which in the margins has the following notes: “piece of asininity”, “elephantine”, “buffoon”, “evil poltroon”, “ungrateful villain”. He was not a fan. (Grassi was more correct on this topic.)

For all of Galileo's intelligence, he was a somewhat of an ass, and alienated a lot of people. His Il Saggiatore (The Assayer) was an attack of Grassi's view; Grassi responded with Assagiatore (Winetaster—insinuating that Galileo was drunk when you wrote his book).

Academics (and politics) was a blood sport back then.

Galileo did a lot of good work, but at the end of the day, I'm not sure we needed him for progress to have been made. The word "revolutionary" being used towards Copernicus' heliocentrism is probably warranted. Tycho Brahe's hard work in making observations were key in the effort, and it was Johannes Kepler's idea of breaking free of circular orbits (that everyone else was using) over to elliptical ones that was a real innovation in modelling.

(Galileo preferred the Copernican system, while Grassi preferred Tychonic. Kepler, with elliptical orbits, ended up being correct.)

>In the USA they typically do something different: put the name in whatever product that barely resembles the original, like they did with their “manchego” cheese, a label put in all kinds of cheese-like products.

For many cheeses they don't have much off a choice. Since (young) raw milk cheeses can't be sold in the states they try to get as close as they can, but usually only succeed in looks, rarely in taste.

Except manchego is an aged cheese so that wouldn't be an issue there. Not only that, but manchego can be made from pasteurised milk.

They do have a choice, come up with an original name.

“In the USA they typically do something different: put the name in whatever product that barely resembles the original”

A cheese expert told me most of the Parmesan sold in the US is actually Asiago.

As a Texan I am all for calling this pork product jamon tejano or just Texas ham. Hell, let’s go all Texas and feed them pecans instead of acorns.

"put the name in whatever product that barely resembles the original, like they did with their “manchego” cheese"

Or with cheddar cheese! How awful is that substance they mark with the word cheddar and sell in stores in the states! Argh!

I had a cheese marked “Gruyere” in the US which was a bleached white paste.

Or the "mozzarella" on the pizzas which is actually oil and protein-based

I really dislike that the US took the name 'Cheddar' and applied it to basically mean generic cheese with no other characteristics. Traditional Cheddar is a great cheese with its own merits.

Something like the sharper Cabot cheddars aren't bad for a day-to-day cheese. But it certainly is a completely different cheese than artisanal long-aged cheddars whether from the UK or the US.

For a great US alternative, try Prairie Breeze by Milton Creamery (in Iowa). Very tasty stuff.

https://miltoncreamery.com/prairie-breeze/

Cheddar is a name of a process as well as a location.

I think that's 'cheddaring'. So they could call it 'cheddared cheese' instead of 'Cheddar cheese' like they do at the moment.

huh. when did this happen with manchego? i remember noticing a number of years ago that it simultaneously became a lot more common and not as good.

Maybe there's more Mexican food in your area, since Mexico has used "manchego" for a while to refer to a kind of cow's milk cheese.

In Mexico manchego is a very specific cheese and definitively not used to define generic cow cheese.

It's a specific cheese, but I think it's the one that the original commenter is seeing - it tastes much more "normal" to Americans than Spanish manchego, and I've never seen the label on anything other than the two kinds.

A very specific variety of the most genericized melting cheese in the entire country which isn’t even kind of close to queso manchego in Spain, but the previous commenter already mentioned it was “a specific kind” of cheese anyways.

we have acorns, so maybe we could make the real thing?

Texas could make jamón tejano de bellota.

How about Texan Ibérico? Then it's still clear where the product was made while also describing what it's supposed to be similar to.

Words have meaning, and "Texan Ibérico" (or "tejano ibérico")… doesn't really make any sense?

Plus the original suggestion does make it clear what it's supposed to be similar to: normal texan ham would be called "ham".

Well to me it would mean Ibérico ham not produced in Spain but in Texas using a very similar method, what about it doesn't make sense? It's also not really different from what's mentioned in the article where they say: "It will be marketed as jamón ibérico armericano or Ibericus meat."

> Ibérico ham not produced in Spain but in Texas using a very similar method, what about it doesn't make sense?

That is not from the Iberian peninsula. This is like having a sticker "intel" on a computer when there is no intel inside, but an equivalent AMD chip.

For people whose geography / chip knowledge is low, the difference may seem superficial. Doesn't mean the advertising is correct though.

Ibérico in this case doesn't refer to the place of origin (Iberia) but the type of pig (Black Iberian).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jam%C3%B3n

Non-Ibérico ham is usually called "jamón serrano".

So logically, ham made in Texas from Black Iberian pigs could be called Texan Iberico. But I like the ring of "jamón tejano" -- I would certainly buy that! (Texas has a positive halo effect when it comes to meat products)

In American English when you name a food you are referencing the source of the cuisine, not the literal source of the ingredients themselves. If I saw Iberian Ham at the store, I would assume it tastes like the Spanish product, not that it is from Spain. I would assume “jamón tejano” was some sort of Texas BBQ.

> In American English when you name a food you are referencing the source of the cuisine, not the literal source of the ingredients themselves.

That is by no means a hard and fast rule. Consider:

- Alaskan salmon

- Napa Valley Cabernet

- Michigan Cherries

- Georgia Peaches

All of these refer to the places they are produced.

And of course there are examples where the place name has fossilized into the product itself:

- Monterey Jack cheese

- Arkansas gold apples

China buys a large amount of our pork-based products, to boot, if they were the source they wouldn't want our ham so bad. There are rumors that we are selling them most of the best stuff and then we get lower quality leftovers for local consumption, even, but I have seen no formal evidence for this yet. Although it might explain why it's so much lower quality lately.

Swiss cheese is produced in the US and hamburgers are not always from Hamburg. I don't really see the problem. If consumers want to know where it's from then the country of origin can be included on the package.

Sure! Then let me then sell my own kind of iPhone. For Apple it's enough to write on the package that is made in California to make the consumers aware /s