The best prosciuttos and mozzarellas are from Italy. The best teas are from China. Why can’t anyone who wants to recreate the process anywhere they want? In a greenhouse? In a factory?
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I used to work at a high end deli in London that sold a lot of the best charcuterie and cheese from across Europe.
Like a few other people have said small regional differences in bacteria, plant life, along with several other factors etc that exist in these regions are not possible to replicate elsewhere.
As an example, there’s a specific prosciutto called San Daniele we sold, which the makers of it used to say owed it’s flavour (it was quite unique to the others) to the specific winds that blew from the mountains down to the Adriatic where they cured all their meat.
On the cheese side, when you’re dealing with some small artisanal cheese producers they don’t operate the way large manufacturers do. Recipes aren’t measured to the gram and are a bit more by ‘feel’. Batch to batch a lot of the cheese we sold would have slightly varied flavours.
Edit: also as some other have noted some of these products have effective legal protection. AOC (France) or DOP (Italy) are legal measures (think like Champagne with wine) in place that limit the production of certain specific cheeses to one area or one single producer.
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