Talk:Brunost

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Definitions[edit]

Geitost tastes different in many different "fylker" as found in Norge. If you want the most different, or at least the most authentic, Norsk Geitost "taste" - look for something on the packaging that looks a lot like "EKTE" - as spelled in the Norwegian language. I'm 100% certain that I can still taste that difference. AND -- GammelOst still tastes "tangy" to me. MMMMM -- TANGGEE!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Viking70 (talk • contribs) 03:51, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As a descendent of Norwegians from Gudbransdalen who currently lives in New Mexico, where discussion about this wonderful cheese and Old Norse is rare, thanks for keeping the culture alive- There is also Primost- A memory from my youth in Minnesota, that as I recall is the margarine version of Gjetost. 71.222.242.30 23:55, 14 October 2007 (UTC)A. Brendal[reply]

"Gjetost"(goat cheese) or "brunost" (brown cheese) is not REALLY a cheese, by normal definitions, but a milk product. Rather, gjetost and brunost is made of the left over materials from normal cheese production. Real cheese is in Norwegian named "gulost" (yellow cheese).

The "normal definition" of cheese is surprisingly expansive. For instance, ricotta cheese, like gjetost, is made from whey. Sneftel 07:10, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Gjetost" is dano-norwegian gibberish, and the official word from the official Norwegian dictionary is "Geitost". see Bokmålsordboka for more info

Not being Norwegian, I find the whole dispute between bokmål and landsmål or nynorsk or whatever it's called these days somewhat amusing. Nonetheless I think the comment above is likely to offend somebody, being blatantly of the POV of bokmål proponents. (No need to use the word "official" twice there.) A whole wiki article could be written up about about this issue as it is somewhat interesting. Having been in northern Sweden, "gjetost" was the usual spelling I came across (at least on the packages it was sold in). 130.94.162.64 01:14, 4 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Of course the comment is offensive. That's why it's not in the main article. However, in essence the poster is correct - the term gjetost is used very infrequently in Norway, while geitost is the term found in most writing, on products, and in dictionaries. -- Ranveig 18:45, 6 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I just don't like the attitude of whoever anonymously and unilaterally changed the name of the article and posted that comment (about "dano-norwegian gibberish"). It's "I'm right and everyone else is not only wrong but an idiot to boot." That attitude comes across pretty clearly no matter what language you speak. Yes, I know that comment isn't in the article, but it's what I found when I tried to figure out why the title had such an odd spelling. 130.94.162.64 03:52, 8 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Mainly correct in facts, but the appropriate Norwegian spelling of the animal is "gjet" = goat, hence "gjetost", I think.
What would happen to the good old song, known to so many children, should one change to the modern "geit" - the rhyme would simply disappear: "Å jeg vet en seter, med så mange gjeter ..." Kittybrewster 12:26, 18 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
That depends on your pronunciation of seter. In my dialect, it rhymes perfectly with geiter PRB 08:56, 28 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The official spelling of goat is «geit» in both standards of Norwegian. Old songs are of course kept as they are until their wording becomes old-fashioned enough to sound like gibberish. I think we're still a long way away from that with the song you mentioned. :-) -- Ranveig 13:50, 18 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the problem with the "official spelling of goat is geit" argument is that we're not really discussing what the official name for "goat" is at all. We're discussing whether the word "gjetost" is used by any significant number of people, (regardless of what goats are called according to government officials) to describe what most people call "geitost". Case in point; Gamalost. "Gamal" is not the official word in either nynorsk or bokmål, but TINE sells it by that name. And it is commonly known by that name. So is anyone going to advocate removing the "gamalost" entry based on the "geit+ost" logic?
Hmm, well, speaking however from a North American perspective, maybe it's just coincidence but I've only ever seen it spelt "Gjetost" . . . so I'm not sure if I can agree that it's an inarguable idea to have changed the name of the article. In the case of Geitost versus Gjetost, I think it's simply not so cut and dry as to which term is the common usage, and my own (albeit potentially myoptic) experience points rather strongly in the favour of Gjetost. Phil Urich 05:32, 28 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If you can show that there is precedence in the use of gjetost rather than geitost in English, then it should b changed back. Geitost is however the correct for in both Bokmål and Nynorsk, as stated above. Most Norwegian-americans left migrated before the norwegianisation-reforms of bokmål, thus do they often tend to use arhcaic spelling. In modern Norwegian gjetost is in fact "dano-norwegian-gibberish", althougt I would not use such an expression.--Njård 07:41, 28 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
"official word from the official Norwegian dictionary"
Norway has an official dictionary? — who regulates it? Does it cover all dialects?
To add to the current discussion, I've only come across it spelt gjetost (ROI), once gjetöst, but that source also claimed it was from Sweden.
Njál 01:44, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Norway has an official language council [1], it regulates both [Nynorsk] and [Bokmål]. The dialects are only used in spoken form or informal writing (Chating, notes, SMS-messenges etc. between friends and family) and has because of this no standard spelling. The ö in Gjetöst, as in your example is not even a nowegiab letter, nor would a swede spell it like that, it is pronounced and written OST in both countries.--Njård 08:44, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
True. But quite apart from the fact that it does not actually have any powers over Wikipedia (and quite apart from the fact that we Norwegians seem to always think that if the government says something, it must be correct), it does not describe the reality of the Norwegian language, merely how they would like it to be. And Wikipedia is all about how things *really* are. Including what words and terms subversive elements of the population, with utter disregard for official policy, may use. Oh, and as previously mentioned, geitost/gjetost are independent terms that may develop along their own paths. They are not in any way automatically linked to the words that were once used to create it. So trying to disect the word will not yield much useful knowledge or insight.
This discussion really made me laugh, although I can see it strikes many as important—and it is. "Gjetost" and "geitost" are definitively not independent terms, but synonymous words from different historical periods of time. If it's a Norwegian cheese, when referring to the Norwegian name of that cheese, the correct Norwegian and official spelling should also used—and not some ancient relic of a word. Anything else would just be cheesy... As for how things really are, that's about as close as it gets.
I don't speak "Bokmål" myself. I speak a Norwegian dialect. But well over 80 percent of Norwegians have aggreed to write "Bokmål". That's called a consensus. A thing I believe Wikipedians have a certain amount respect for. It simply isn't possible to make one generic language to accommodate every Norwegian dialect, and that's why there's a competing language to "Bokmål" (i.e. "Nynorsk"), and also why they both are officially monitored (not governed). The same thing goes for English (except for official monitoring). Why else can you hear Americans everywhere rant at strange slang-words with "Speak English!"
Incidentally, when Norwegians refer to English or American artefacts by their English names, they do so with modern English (American or Oxford), and not so with Old English—even though that more closely resembles the Old Norse, which, also incidentally, had a profound effect on how modern English is both written and spoken today. Things change, they say, and things change for a reason. I'm pretty sure most English speakers are pretty happy about not having to speak Old English anymore (except for the odd Tolkien buff), as we Norwegians are happy for not having to speak Old Norse. Very happy! The syntax was terribly difficult. –Kebman 17:45, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]


How is my explanation of "gjetost" as "archaic Dano-Norwegian" not "opinion-neutral and factually relevant"? Simply calling it "an older spelling" is not sufficient. It could lead people to believe that it was older Norwegian, or that they are pronounced the same, or even that "geit" has somehow evolved from "gjet", which couldn't be more incorrect. The difference between "geit" and "gjet" is the loss of the diphtong in the latter, which is a trait it shares with the Danish "ged". It was a Dano-Norwegian word, and is archaic as it does not exist in bokmål, or in speech by anyone but an infinately small minority that is quicly dying out. -- Nidator T / C 15:42, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Norwegian in itself IS "dano-norwegian", and "gjetost" is not archaic AT ALL. It's still used widely in rural areas and by the elderly.
"gjet" comes from the word "gjeter", "å gjete" (from norse "Gæta") and those words ARE in both the nynorsk and the bokmål dictionary. I don't know anyone who actually says "en gjet" as opposed to "en geit" (norse "geit"), but many do say "gjetost" - even those who write/speak riksmaal. And I don't know anyone who says "å geite" instead of "å gjete", or "en geiter" instead of "en gjeter". In in both nynorsk and bokmål, it's "gjette geitene" - not "geita geitene".
So "Gjete" IS used, and it's not improbable that that's the meaning behind the "gjet" in "gjetost". And it's also likely that it's an old dialect word, most likely from rural areas (Kongsvinger or Toten f.ex). "Gjete" is also used in different contexts in nynorsk:


II gjete [kløyvd inf -a] gjet [gjeter], gat, gjete el. -i (norr geta) 

 1	*gisse (II), gjette, tippe g- (på) kva som hender / g- gåter / g- rett, gale
 2	nemne, seie, tale (om) ho gat ikkje eit ord / gjet ikkje noko om dette! /
eg har høyrt gjete ... høyrt omtalt
 3	gidde eg gat ikkje svare
It doesn't really matter if "gjetost" today is considered to be inappropriate Norwegian; if it has roots in tradition then it's all right to use it ON the product label and when referring to the product (such as this wikipedia article) - but only then. The rest of us should use "brunost" to avoid confusing people with the french goat's cheese.
And about all the dialect fuss: NO, it's not considered proper to write in dialect AT ALL. We use bokmål and nynorsk, and only those. This is simply to avoid confusion because a dialect can be like a whole different language to someone who speaks a different one. I speak the Fredrikstad dialect, I hardly think that "tællekæll", "tønna", "pælær", "mædda" etc should be used in written Norwegian. Hællæ dø han kællæn tælla mæg på tønna me pælæne. Raise a hand if anyone understood that.--85.166.51.162 (talk) 20:11, 8 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Geitost??[edit]

Geitost is a sub-genre of brunost. Why is brunost redirected here? The english word for nn:Geitost is Chèvre cheese, which has little to do with brunost. This article is about brunost, not geitost. --Tannkremen 00:01, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree Acidburn24m 01:42, 16 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yup, I definitely agree too, brunost (brown cheese) is the superior category, while geitost is a type of brunost. Who came up with this nonsense? I hope no Norwegian? Anyway, the article should be called either brunost or brown cheese. Oh and by the way, comparing this article to the Norwegian one I find lots of inconsistencies and what I'm guessing are plain errors too. Someone should take a look at the Norwegian article and clean up the English one. Jonmagne 04:34, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I fixed it --Acidburn24m 11:41, 19 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Roald Dahl?[edit]

I used to read roald dahl a lot as a kid, and specifically remember him mentioning the tall, brown rather sweetish cheese at every norwegian table called gjetost (which redirects to this article). Think it's worth a mention? He's a pretty widely read author and he mentioned it a few times in his autobiographies as well as in some of his short stories. Squiggle 17:47, 29 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]


No, I don't so. Then we'd have to add all the other popular culture references... and there are a lot. Roald Dahl was norwegian, and brunost is one of the most norwegian things out there; same with skis and nisser. Him making a reference to such a traditional thing is trivial imo. --85.166.51.162 (talk) 19:43, 8 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ski queen cheese?[edit]

When I went to a reception hosted by the Norsk embassy yesterday, there was brunost on toast to sample (and it got eaten pretty fast, as well as the other good stuff), so I got talking about it with the cultural attaché who spoke German really well but mentioned that the English term is "ski queen cheese". When searching for the term, I didn't find an explanation (what female ski ace does it refer to? the only ski cracks I can dig up are men though they are plentiful) but this term indeed seems to be used as the (or one of the) English translation(s) for geitost.

I'm not a native speaker and what's more, the discussion appears to be a bit loaded, so I'll leave it to others to decide this. Enjoy --WernR (talk) 12:47, 10 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The packaging I've found in American supermarkets calls it "Gjetost cheese" (goat cheese cheese). Ski Queen appears to be a brand name, and it looks like it's a product of TINE. See http://www.thekitchn.com/closest-cheese-to-fudge-gjetos-139961 or http://www.amazon.com/Queen-Gjetost-Original-Goat-Cheese/dp/B002XWZH1U for images of the packaging. Sommerfeld (talk) 20:32, 22 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Nutritional value[edit]

This edit removed both the assertion by a "controversial" writer on nutrition (word used in the source I found; his statement had previously been placed as if it was undisputed, and tagged as unreferenced) that brunost is comparable nutritionally to milk chocolate and thus that Norwegians should eat less of it, and the preceding statement that it has usually been thought of as containing valuable nutrients. I don't think the removal of both statements should pass without comment: the article should say something about nutritional value, and the statement that it is unhealthy caused a stir so there is a good argument that the article should reflect this. Of course, overall the article is under-referenced; my preference would be for adding a lot more references, including one to a less controversial view of the nutritional value, and then re-adding the criticism would not be open to being called undue weight. Yngvadottir (talk) 19:37, 23 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Taste?[edit]

If Norwegians, et al, are unable to find a native that has a palate and (English) vocabulary adequate to describe the (typical) taste of this material (range of tastes), a French chef can surely be found. I understand that unlike wine there are no standardized meaning attributed to descriptors for this (or are there?), never the less, it is clear to me that some effort should be made to describe its taste (or possibly compare it to some mainstream food tastes (of major English speaking population groups)). Oh, my sarcastic way to say that not even making an attempt to describe the taste is really just inadequate. I note that the word "sweet" doesn't even appear in the article! (If it is so?) I came here to see a description of the product, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that description of a 'simple' food product should attempt to include taste.216.96.77.254 (talk) 19:10, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

To be fair, the article did make clear that the whey turns into caramel, giving it its characteristic taste. That's what the descriptions I could find all said. I added one that seemed suitably reliably sourced. Yngvadottir (talk) 22:21, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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