MOSCOW — Ramping up enforcement of a ban on European food imports, the Russian authorities on Thursday destroyed hundreds of tons of foodstuffs they said violated the proscription, instituted a year ago in retaliation for Western sanctions over Ukraine.

Following an order by President Vladimir V. Putin, officials threw huge piles of pork, tomatoes, peaches and cheese into landfills and garbage incinerators.

The frenzy, remarkable even by the standards of Russia’s recent politicization of food supplies, was gleefully reported by Russian state television.

“You can see behind me cheese that was made nobody knows where, without labels,” Yekaterina Mironova, a journalist on Rossiya 24 television, standing before a gigantic mound of orange cheese rounds, as a bulldozer revved its engine in the background.