It’s hard to imagine how pitiful the American cheese scene would be without immigrants. No Spanish, Dutch, English, Swiss, Italians or Germans? All right then: no cows, goats or sheep. Europeans introduced them all. We would have no Dutch Holstein, English Jersey or Brown Swiss cows. No Spanish La Mancha or Swiss Saanen goats. No Vella Dry Jack or Calabro hand-dipped ricotta (Italian), no Widmer’s Cheddar (Swiss), Cacique Cotija (Mexican) or Marieke Gouda (Dutch). How sad is that?

How do you make the world’s best cheese? For one answer, I turned to Marc Druart, master cheesemaker and senior director of R&D for Emmi Roth USA. Roth’s Grand Cru Surchoix scored highest (98.882 points) at this year’s World Championship Cheese Contest, which makes it the World Champion Cheese. I wanted to know how you transform cow’s milk into a wheel that’s just one point shy of perfect.