The Trump Administration’s clumsy introduction of punitive tariffs recalls the days when similarly capricious sanctions wreaked havoc over Moscow food supplies that ended up in a shuttle trade in cheese.

In 2014, those of us living in Russia were still managing the fallout over the seizure of Crimea, the effects of which reverberated broadly throughout the social, political and economic life of the country.

Obviously, the conflict in eastern Ukraine was of paramount concern, as friends in Moscow, Kyiv and beyond tried to come to grips with the senseless violence that erupted in the region. But on one particular day in late 2014, Ukraine and the tit-for-tat of sanctions were far from my mind as I navigated through Borough Market in London. What I needed that day was cheese. And Neil’s Yard, a renowned English cheese monger, presented an opportunity to score some junket while on my own junket.

The need for cheese stemmed from Russia’s ban on a broad range of food imports from the European Union and other countries in summer 2014. At the time, the ban was justified as part of some rhythm of sanctions and countersanctions issued following the annexation of Crimea. In a familiar refrain, many suspected that some nefarious agribusiness interests had finally succeeded in securing their own effective subsidy. Nevertheless, the change was profound. In 2013, the EU exported over €12bn in meat, dairy, fruits and vegetables to Russia; by 2015, this figure had fallen over 40%. Russians invariably paid more for food, but they didn’t go hungry.

In real terms, the ban effectively robbed our pantries of a range of luxury foodstuffs. Polish apples, pork from Denmark and Irish butter soon disappeared from stores, but in most cases, replacements were readily available. “Baku” tomatoes, both locally grown and those from Azerbaijan, and mandarins from Abkhazia were far tastier anyway than their Dutch and Spanish counterparts. Russia had already blocked American chicken imports, ostensibly due to risk of avian flu, but the only consequence in stores was that no one called drumsticks nozhki Busha, (legs of Bush) a relic of the late 1980s and 1990s when the Soviets began importing chicken under the 41^st President. A café Americano was renamed a Russiano, a reminder of when “Freedom Fries” were the rage, but as many pundits have noted recently, the coffee beans don’t come from America. My wife, drawing upon her Soviet upbringing, bought kilos of strawberries and sugar for making preserves in anticipation of a winter without berries from the United States. I pointed out, however, that the ban didn’t cover her favourite French jam, only the agricultural inputs. She ate the berries without remorse.

As expected, a cottage industry of smuggling – ubiquitous in the late Soviet period and 1990s – re-emerged. Most prominently, a brisk trade in ‘Belorussian oysters’ arose as Belarus became a conduit for European contraband, in particular seafood, despite the country’s lack of coastline. A fishmonger at the famous Dorogomilovsky market had a tank of Maine lobsters, distinguishable by their large claws. I asked where they were from. “Azerbaijan!” he proudly exclaimed.

To any longtime resident of Russia, such dislocations were by no means anything new; at one point of time, everyone serve as effective mules, or in Russian parlance chelnoki (shuttle traders) – the 1990s small-scale business of travelling somewhere to fill up a suitcase with luxury goods to sell in the market back home for profit – for colleagues, families and friends when they travel.

As I made frequent trips to the United States, I was always asked to deliver iPhones, watches and other indulgences that were either hard-to-find or relatively expensive in Moscow. Necessity, too, compelled us to act; I once schlepped a duffel bag of diapers from Prague to Moscow to a needy colleague when the ruble crash of 1998 caused deliveries of Pampers to seize up. More recently, because US-sourced beef also fell under the 2014 ban, my rabbi asked me to bring frozen, kosher cuts of brisket from his home in Brooklyn. When I saw other Orthodox Jews gathering in prayer during the flight, I hoped they were offering an orison to ensure my meat-laden suitcases would be delivered before the meat thawed.

For some reason, though, it was the cheese deficit that captured everyone’s imagination, and this absence was the source of much torment. Certain types, like Greek feta, could be swapped for Serbian brynza, but the very best cheeses require particular processes, unique forage and perhaps most importantly, time. Good cheese is aged, and not for weeks but for years. A slice of young Gouda may add flavour to a sandwich, but an aged four-year variety can deliver a satisfying salt kick to satiate even the lactose-intolerant. Cheeses are even branded by age. The coveted Parmigiano Reggiano, probably the greatest loss we mourned, is sold in increments of maturity from 24 to 100 months. Even if an entrepreneurial Russian started making a hard cheese tomorrow, we understood it could be years until we see it in Moscow food stores. This is a lifetime to a turophile coping with caseus withdrawal.

As I entered Neil’s Yard, my face lit up at the site of wheels of cheese both familiar and foreign stacked about the store. I lost myself in the fantastical, almost fairytale names of cheeses: I chuckled at Ticklemore, a variety called ‘Isle of Mull’ brooded in the corner, and another, Yr Afr, I didn’t dare try to pronounce. After so many cheeseless months, I sampled a variety of Cheshire on offer and naturally grinned like the cat of the same name.

Time was limited, as I had only an hour before I needed to leave for the airport, so I found a salesperson to place my order: six sizable blocks of Parmigiano, another six of cheddar, an assortment of goats and blues, and a wedge of the delectable Cheshire. In the end, I spent over £400, so much that they gave me free tote bags to handle the 20 or so odd vacuum-packed blocks that I now had to carry to Moscow.

But I wasn’t the first from Moscow to visit Neil’s Yard. Just as agents in the 1930s recruited unemployed American steelworkers to come to the Soviet Union, an eager Russian had come days earlier, I was told, to invite workers from the store to come to Russia and teach the arts of the affineur. Soon Russia would import thousands of cattle from the very countries whose meat exports it had banned (not to mention ranchers and cowboys to wrangle them) to jumpstart its own nascent beef industry. Meanwhile, an enterprising group headed to Italy, which soon was shipping machinery to Russia to make mozzarellas and other fresh cheeses locally. By mid-2015, a salad of Baku tomatoes and local burrata was as good as anywhere in Europe. Of course, we could still purchase the Italian balsamic glaze at any local grocery store; the import of European oils and vinegars were not affected by the ban.

For Americans today, however, the pain of Trump’s tariffs can’t be offset by chelnoki delivering vacuum-packed cheeses on a whim. Farming isn’t manufacturing, just as Russia isn’t the United States in economic terms, and the scope and scale of the ‘liberation’ tariffs are far greater. Reorienting multiple supply chains will require far more financial resources and time than, say, the EU eventually provided for its farmers who lost sales in Russia (or what Trump did in 2017 for US farmers in response to the introductions of steel tariffs against China). Like the Kremlin, the White house has senselessly declared war against its major trading partners, but unlike the White House, the Kremlin had clear, attainable strategic objectives in mind. “Philadelphia” cream cheese, we joked, might be renamed as “Feodosia”, the Crimean city on the Black Sea.

In the longer term, Russians paid more for their food, but the quality, variety and taste of Russian food did improve dramatically. Renewed interest in locally sourced products promoted a farm-to-table scene that was as exciting as anywhere, and established Moscow and St. Petersburg as foodie paradises. Russia today boasts greater food security and has long been a net exporter of grain, factors that has helped it better weather subsequent waves of sanctions since its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Should Americans have any such reason for optimism, even for a cultural boon like in Russia? Probably not. While burrata and mozzarella are relatively easy to make, more complex cheese, not unlike automobiles, iPhones or semiconductors, is far more difficult. American cheesemakers make high-quality cheddars, but Grafton Village or Tillamook Creamery already find plenty of demand within the United States. In Russia, there have been some efforts to produce aged cheeses, but after more than 100 months since the EU ban, the time it takes to mature a wheel of Parmigiano, I never come across a distinctive, tasty and locally produced hard cheese. Immigrants in Argentina have been trying since the 1920s to replicate the Parmigiano Reggiano of their native Italy. The resulting Reggianito is good, but not chelnok-worthy. Parm is parm for a reason.

Naturally, before my own wife departed for Moscow from our home in Dubai last week, she made a ritual trip to our local Waitrose to pick up a few blocks of cheddar, Manchego and the like as gifts for our friends. Given the expected increase in the US of prices for iPhones and the like, I wonder if I’ll revert to making a stop at the Apple Store to buy tariff-free devices for friends eager to avoid paying the Trump tax before my next trip back to America.