Tour an Italian cheese factory with the U.S. Pizza Team at www.PizzaTV. com.

Until the 20th century and even well into it, the transumanza was more than a semiannual event. It was a way of life with its own customs and traditions that went back thousands of years, not only in Italy, but also in many other countries, most but not all of them located in the Mediterranean Basin. The English form of the word is transhumance. It refers to the practice of driving sheep, cattle, goats and other animals to pastures in the meadows high up on mountains or hills at the beginning of summer and back down to low-lying areas at the approach of winter.

Until the present century, it was physically impossible, or too expensive, to bring sufficient feed to the animals in lower areas where their owners lived. Certain members of each community had the responsibility, therefore, of conducting the animals to summer pasture, remaining with them for months at a time to protect them from predators and then bringing them back to their owners. Those herdsmen were almost certainly responsible for the invention, or at least the development, of one of the most important (and tastiest) food resources known to man: cheese.

Initially, animals were domesticated and maintained for their milk. As long as the herds remained within close range of their owners’ homes, there was no problem. If the herds were absent for months at a time, however, the community would be deprived of a food that was essential to its health and survival. One solution was for the entire community to follow the animals and, in some parts of the world, nomadic peoples still do. But those who wanted dwellings more permanent than tents stayed home and sent the herds away for the summer. They could do so because of the discovery of the process by which milk is transformed into cheese, a solid food that can be stored for many months and even improve in flavor in the process.

During the summer, the herdsmen milked their animals and made cheese that, since it was highly compact, they could easily take with them back to their homes when the time came to leave the heights. The types of cheeses they made depended on numerous factors, including geography, climate and taste. In Italy, the pastures of the Alps are more extensive and, since they are located at higher altitudes, more luxuriant than meadows in the country’s far south, so that they can be grazed by cattle.

Vegetation is sparser in the south and the summer drought more intense and prolonged, which means that pastures there are more suitable for sheep and goats. In general, the Apennines, which cut across the center of the Italian peninsula from the Tyrrhenian to the Adriatic seas, separate the sheep and the goats from the cows. Although there are numerous exceptions, cow’s-milk cheeses are more common to the north and pecorini and caprini to the south of the mountains. However, the internationally known Italian cheese Mozzarella is a wild card since the original and most authentic version is drawn from a more exotic source, the buffalo.

Differences among cheeses are not due solely to the species of animal that provides the milk, as anyone who has tasted a variety of Pecorino or sheep’s milk cheeses knows. While there is always a family resemblance, each has a different texture, tint, odor and flavor. Those variations are due to climates and vegetation as well as the techniques used by the producers. The season of the year when the milk is collected is also important, since the same cheese has a different taste if it is made in the spring or the fall. Aging is another distinguishing factor. Some cheeses or versions of the same cheese are specifically made to be eaten fresh, while others are best when they have aged several months or even a year or more.

Cheeses can be salty, neutral or sweet and the basic flavors are altered in some cases by the addition of spices and herbs, such as peppercorns and saffron. Producers once smoked cheeses to enhance their keeping capacities but the practice has survived because people find the flavor attractive. Any attempt to explain why Italians developed their extraordinarily wide range of cheeses inevitably brings to mind that perennial query, “which came first, the chicken or the egg?” Did the regional or even local character of the cooking spawn a host of different cheeses or did the cooks, inspired by the variety of cheeses available, invent appropriate and distinctive dishes? Both questions should probably be answered in the affirmative but there is no doubt that the cooking of each region has tended to highlight local cheeses.

Over the centuries, Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano have infiltrated the dishes of many other Italian regions but they were originally an essential element of the traditional cooking of the Po Valley and they still are. In Italian cookery, cheeses are used in innumerable ways. They are grated and sprinkled over soups and pastas and incorporated in a myriad of stuffings and sauces. They are roasted, toasted and fried to be consumed as dishes in their own right. They are gratinéd over meats, poultry, fish and vegetables, sealing in flavors and imparting their own special savor to the dish. Sweetened with honey, sugar and grape must, they constitute the foundations of a host of tantalizing desserts. Alone or accompanied by a goblet of wine and a bit of bread, they make a fitting conclusion to a fine meal or an energizing snack. Applying their know-how and flair, generations of Italian cooks have found ways of using cheese that are as varied as the food itself. Cheeses produced in Italy are now available in food stores throughout the United States. They are often imitated but only the authentic versions give Italian preparations their true flavors, odors and consistencies. Any roster of Italian cheeses will almost necessarily be incomplete but the following types should appear at least occasionally on everyone’s shopping list.

Parmagiano Reggiano is the most famous and highly prized of all Italian cheeses. Wheels of Parmigiano Reggiano weighing about 70 pounds each are aged from slightly less than one year to more than two years.

Parmigiano Reggiano
This firm, grainy cow’s-milk cheese has been made in the area around the Po Valley, in the cities of Parma and Reggio Emilia, since the early Middle Ages. It is the most famous and highly prized of all Italian cheeses. Wheels of Parmigiano Reggiano weighing about 70 pounds each are aged from slightly less than one year to more than two years. When the wheel is first cut open, flakes of the cheese are incomparable when consumed as a separate course, accompanied perhaps by pears or other fresh fruit but assuredly with a goblet of red wine. The grated cheese is used in a vast number of dishes, enhancing their flavors and textures. The cheese should be slivered with the aid of a flat trowel-shaped knife that is inserted into the body and twisted. It is best when freshly grated and should, therefore, be purchased in large pieces.

Grana Padano
Made in parts of four provinces in the Po Valley, the cheese is produced in the same way as Parmigiano Reggiano and has much the same light, nutty flavor, although in a somewhat more subdued degree. It can be enjoyed on its own but it is probably most popular as a grating cheese. Grana Lodigiano, made around the town of Lodi in Lombardy, is usually consumed alone, at the end of a meal. It has a slighty greenish tinge and “weeps when it is cut.”

Pecorino
While sheep’s-milk cheeses have long been consumed in large quantity in Italy, they began to catch on in a big way in other countries only in recent decades. Many fans say they are more easily digested than cow’s-milk cheeses, a claim that owes more to preference and habit than science. Although Pecorino are produced throughout central and southern Italy, four regionally based versions are best known at home and abroad: Pecorino Romano, Sardo, Siciliano and Toscano. The Romano is aged the longest  (eight months) and it has a distinctively rustic, yet at the same time refined, flavor. It’s often grated and appears in countless southern recipes, in which it is irreplaceable. The Sardo is slightly piquant. Siciliano can be eaten fresh and creamy, when it is known as Tuma, or aged, when it is grated. The Toscano is delicate and yielding and almost invariably eaten alone. It is not regarded as suitable for grating.

Where would pizza be without Mozzarella? The best cheese is made entirely from the milk of buffaloes (from India; they are not the American bison). Given the scarcity of the animals, however, the type found in most U.S. stores will be produced from the milk of cows or, in the best of cases, a mixture.

Mozzarella di Bufala Campana
Where would pizza be without Mozzarella? Confined to Naples, no doubt, and not too popular there. The best cheese is made entirely from the milk of buffaloes (from India; they are not the American bison). Given the scarcity of the animals, however, the type found in most U.S. stores will be produced from the milk of cows or, in the best of cases, a mixture. The cheese is used in many dishes besides pizza, and it is delicious alone, provided it is truly fresh, with perhaps a bit of olive oil and coarse, freshly–ground black pepper. 

Gorgonzola
One of the finest – some would argue the best – of the world’s blue cheeses, Gorgonzola is made from cow’s milk in an area to the north of Milan. The delicate greenish-blue vein is achieved by pricking the cheese at various points with long needles which admit the air and mold spores. The ripening process requires about 50 days. The cheese should be eaten as fresh as possible. It has long been popular as the ingredient of various dishes, some rustic, as in its use as a topping for grilled polenta, and some sophisticated, as when it’s blended with cream to make a sauce for pastas and gnocchi. However, it’s still best when consumed alone at the end of a meal and accompanied by a red or more intriguingly, a white, late-harvest, dessert wine.

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