subject: Invention of the Cheese Slicer [print this page] Invention of the Cheese Slicer Invention of the Cheese Slicer
Thousands of years ago, we discovered a magnificent process and created cheese.
The first historical account of cheese making dates back to Sumerian cuneiform tablets around 3500 B.C. The Egyptians left depictions of cheese making on their tomb murals as well. It was a rather crude and rustic process until the Romans, as they did with most things, perfected the art, creating many of the cheeses we are familiar with today.
But while the craft of making cheese soared, the tools for slicing it remained stagnant, regulated to simple knives.
It wasn't until the early 20th century that the cheese slicer as we know it came into being. While the invention of the cheese slicer hardly compares to the importance of Sir Isaac Newton's discovery of gravity, stories of how the two came into being bare a feint resemblance.
One day, in the early 1900s, a Norwegian carpenter by the name of Thor Bjorkland was working in his shop. Breaking for lunch, he sat down and set his carpentry plane next to his meal, consisting of a sandwich and a block of cheese.
I imagine the idea struck Thor initially in a much more pleasant way than it did Newton, as he realized he could apply the same principle of the carpentry plane to a block of cheese and slice deliciously razor thin pieces of cheese for his sandwich.
The cheese slicer, or cheese plane, was patented in 1925 and the world soon was able to slice cheese with the same sophistication that the Romans brought to creating it.
