In the book presentation, the authors mentioned having an explicit objective: “to contribute to disseminating knowledge about the nature and problematic of traditional Mexican cheeses” and, then, they consider urgent for the importance of these products to be understood, in three areas: i) for the country’s food security; ii) in its socioeconomic relevance; and iii) in the preservation of the national dietary culture. This is why they make a call to different actors, among which consumers, institutions and academia stand out, in order for them to contribute, from different fronts, to the knowledge and preservation of these emblematic foods for some regions of the country.

It is a relatively small book, with 197 pages and nine chapters. In them, the authors take up again themes that have been addressed in previous works, perhaps to give it coherence and to allow the reader, primarily the one who ignores their prior studies, to have a general panorama, although it should be clarified that reading it could be carried out in a different order than the one established by the authors, or even of an isolated chapter, and the theme will be understood, due to the cohesion in each one of the chapters, which allows understanding them separately and, at the same time, as part of a whole.

It is a work that fulfills its objective of dissemination, being within reach to practically any reader with an acceptable general culture, since it is written in a simple language that, without losing the rigor demanded from an academic piece of work, allows understanding the general panorama manifested around these very important foods for some regions of the country. Although, on the other hand, it has three chapters of technical scope that require a different kind of reading, further distanced from the one generally carried out by an average reader. Even so, they are still necessary for a better understanding of the make-up and characteristics of these producers.

The book begins with some definitions that are useful during reading, included in the chapter “Definitions, History and Relevance” (Definiciones, Historia y Relevancia); these definitions and the Glossary, already traditional in the different works on the theme by the authors, are truly important because they explain the meaning of concepts both in their academic sense and in the colloquial language used in cheese shops, in addition to making an effort in these sections to provide the study of Mexican cheeses, a specific language that avoids confusions in meaning, through an intellectual and field work construction, subject in which there is work to be done.

Within this context, a premise that has turned out to be fundamental in the definition and characterization of these products is that “authentic cheese must be elaborated with fluid milk and with fluids derived from it and which contain their own components (and same generic microstructure), such as partially skimmed milk and just the cream or mixed” (p:18).

The authors point out that the concept of “traditional” applied to foods should consider four elements: i) food production should be local, regional or national; ii) the product must be authentic; iii) the product must have, at least, 50 years in the commercialization channels; and iv) the product must have a “gastronomic legacy”.

An important section to fulfill the objective of dissemination of these foods is the one where the authors make an analysis that combines the aspects related to the tradition in the elaboration and, we should add, to the consumption of these cheeses and their authenticity. In this regard, the authors consider that “a traditional cheese is a cheese rooted in its history and in its place of origin” (p. 20). The implications of this statement are, primarily, in two aspects, one relative to the production volume and another to the technology used for its elaboration.

Thus, it is considered that traditional cheeses are of limited production, carried out in perfectly limited spaces and with a technological level that makes them intensive in workforce. In this part, it is rather worth mentioning the economic and cultural importance of the type of cheese shop; we can start by saying that these traditional cheeses are elaborated in an artisanal manner, although they are not all authentic.

On the other hand, despite the problems that the statistics available related to the production, distribution and consumption of cheeses have, primarily when the aim is to document the artisanal cheese activity, the evidence points out that the huge majority of the cheeses, or pseudo-cheeses, which are consumed in the country have their origin in the industry and, with an increasingly more important participation, in foreign countries. As consequence, despite how complicated it turns out to be to document the volume that artisanal cheese- making produces, and, as consequence, the amount of traditional cheeses produced, with the exception of some that have been studied specifically and of those about which the number of cheese shops that make them, the amount of cheese they process, the cheese-making yield, and the production period are known, taking into consideration the seasonality in the elaboration of some cheeses, the amount that is marketed can be inferred. On the other hand, the authors agree when they state that traditional cheeses have a cultural relevance for national gastronomy and that, in some cases, they are undervalued products.

Although it should be clarified, limiting the affirmation of their economic importance within the national context, if the cheeses that are consumed in the country are, based on their origin, industrial, imported and artisanal, the evidence shows that the least relevant ones for their contribution to total sales are the last, but, in another sense, they are the ones that truly impact the local economy of the regions where they are produced, generating employment, even for people that formal economy excludes, and stimulating the development of related activities, dairy livestock production, for example.

Three chapters that are especially interesting for a lover of cheeses are the ones that deal with the Quality of Traditional Mexican Cheeses, theme that is addressed from a multifaceted approach that allows understanding the concept of “integral quality”, analyzing it both from their objective part and from subjectivity, the latter related to the gastronomic culture of the consumer and which will be relevant to understand the nostalgia markets. The second addresses the Innocuousness of Traditional Cheeses, where taboos are broken, primarily the one related to mature cheeses made with raw milk, and the fresh cheeses elaborated with this type of milk and the protocols they must comply for a consumer to be able to ingest them with absolute confidence are situated in their real dimension. Finally, the chapter Purchase, Conservation and Cut of Cheeses offers the reader a series of pieces of advice that will allow them to enjoy these products, understanding, preserving and even augmenting their qualities.

As final commentary, this is a book directed at those readers who do not know the previous works in which, in general, the themes are treated in more depth, but which fulfills exactly its objective of disseminating the qualities of these products which, when they are discovered, and surely valued, will result in an unforgettable experience for the consumer.