2016 ITALY Vico Equesne 38 - More Moo Cow Cheese

           After another fabulous breakfast, we departed at 08:15  for a quick 15 minute ride to Caseificio de Gennaro, a provolone del Monaco cheese maker.

The de Gennaro family has been in the dairy farm and cheese-making business for five generations, since 1850. Today there are only five workers make all their cheeses.

The grounds were lovely and included a small production area, several aging rooms, a small "museum," their home, and lovely gardens. Here you see the house to the left up the stairs, the little orange door under the tree branches leads to the production area, with gardens to the right. I'd love to have that commute.

Here's Chef John with the father and son cheese producers.

First a quick look of the "museum." Basically we saw some tools of the trade used in older times. The architecture of the stairwell was also ancient-looking and interesting. Look how worn the stairs are. We didn't get to see what was at the bottom of them. Darn.

I think the discs in the basket were used for weighing.

Shortly after we arrived, a truck with the morning's milking also arrived with raw milk. They only use cow's milk from their own or very nearby farms. Their farm is only two kilometers away. Talk about local !

The milk was pumped into heating kettles. They used wood fire to heat until 1997, when they bought a steam system.

They also make butter which took four hours to churn by hand. In 1950, they bought an electric churner which takes only 15 minutes to do the same job.

From there it was stirred as it was heated to the proper temperature.

At one point rennet (from veal stomach lining) was added to produce the curds (solids) and whey (liquid).

The curds are worked into one bigger solid mass.

As we have described a similar method at other cheeseries, at some point the product is processed in a unique way for a particular cheese. These fellows make about a dozen types of cheese. This time the cheese was stretched and twisted, and finally made into a  a sack-like shape.

This photo shows just how small their production room is. It is maybe twice the size you see here, so very small compared to most other huge facilities we have seen.

Then they sit for a while.

And eventually are hung to age. The style they made today is a semi-hard provolone del Monaco. It will age for about six months and each chunk weighs almost nine pounds (4 kilograms).

To get a little variety, they are stored in different "atmospheres, " humidities, length of aging, packaging, etc. 

They also make miniature cheeses in these small cups (to eat fresh today or tomorrow), as well as ricotta (twice cooked), fior di latte (a semi-soft version of mozzarella), and in-house smoked cheeses.

After the demo, we were invited through their home onto a patio with an expansive view of the land and the sea. Really took my breath away. Imagine having your morning coffee here everyday.

After the tour and quick respite on the patio, we were ushered into the lush garden for a tasting of their cheese products.

There was a quaint stone bench with this Sorrento scene. We would have loved to while away the morning surrounded by the wonderful sights, smells, and tastes. But the clock was ticking so on to our next destination.