What do you call a curly-haired cheese? PERMesan. I know, that was cheesy but they are usually gouda. What can I say, cheesy jokes are my favorite, I know mozza-them and they make me feel grate.
Okay now that that is out of the way, time to get down to business, the cheese business of course. Touring the cheese factories was like being back home in Wisconsin, but they were making Parmigano Reggiano cheese and not cheddar, but I guess I can settle for some amazing Italian cheese instead. The process and long and tedious but the end product is completely worth it.
Parmigano Reggiano cheese is made with only milk, rennet (an enzyme to activate the cheese), and salt. They bring in fresh milk from their cows, skim it, add the rennet and then ‘cook’ the curds of milk and left to settle. Once the curds settle, they are fished out and placed in a cheese cloth and later placed in the molds for the wheels of cheese. The wheels are then left to soak in salt water for around 20-22 days and then later brought to the aging facilities. Parmigano Reggiano cheese usually ages anywhere from 12-30 months but this is one of the only cheeses that has an unlimited aging time. So, the longer it ages, the more tastes come with it and you get more of that umami sense of taste.
But what is a cheese platter without some prosciutto, so our next stop (after a few wrong turns) was a prosciutto processing plant and to meet some prosciutto experts. We entered the plant to be hit with the very strong meaty smell and only grew as we walked through the aging facility, which was wall to wall pig thigh. Quite a sight.
The day brought every type of smell. The farm, cheese, meat, sweet, and everything in between. But by the end of the day, we put our taste buds to the test with a giant group lunch with so much prosciutto, cheese, bread, and a little vino. Can we get any more Italian?(;
[This post was written by Heather Heyrman, a Sophomore studying Health Sciences with a Pre-Medicine Concentration]