Bra cheese

Bra is a northern Italian cheese with Protected Designation of Origin.

History

Named is the guaranteed since the end of the 14th century cheese after the city Bra in Piedmont, on whose market the cheese master from the surrounding mountains, the sold -ripened cheeses. Today in Bra every two years instead of the European cheese Cheese Fair. The annual production volume of Bra cheese is around 800 tons and rising (1999: 788 t/137.849 loaves; 2000: 801 t/144.093 loaves; 2001: 863 t/154.000 loaves ).

Production

First you let the cow's milk for the evening Melkganges overnight in copper kettles are. The next morning the top settled cream is removed with a spatula and then mixed to the morning milk. Then allowed to coagulate the mixture using a starter culture and then added in small quantities something ewe's and goat's milk and 27-32 ° C, warmed Lab of dairy calves added. The right degree of thickness of the resulting curd is determined by plugging a straw in the ground when it remains just stand, it is perfect and comes with a blade broken in a circular motion and crushed into crumbs in size of barley grains, with much of the whey is released. Before the fraction is set in the molds, it is cut a second time. For the duration of one week, the shapes are pressed with a wooden board and complained several times lightly salted. In the manufacture of Bra tenero (see below: variants), the molds can also be immersed in a saturated salt brine. After the loaves come out of the mold and be ever stored in the ripening chamber by type for shorter or longer periods.

Properties

The wheel-shaped loaves with a straight or slightly convex cheek and flat faces have a diameter of 35 to 40 cm with a height of 7 to 10 cm and a weight of 5-8 kg. Taste and texture of bark and dough depend on the type, see the next section. All variants are very smelly.

Variants

Bra ( DOP) (Piedmont) in the province of Turin is manufactured in the province of Cuneo and in the municipality of Villa Franca. It is available in two types:

• Bra tenero from whole milk is aged 45 days to 3 months and is a table cheese with sweet and aromatic flavor. The dough is compact and elastic with a slight small holes, the bark smooth, very thin and elastic, straw- white to parchment- gray color.
• Bra duro from skimmed milk aged for at least six months as grated cheese a year or more, and is a board - and grated cheese with intense spicy flavor. The dough is drier than the tenero, the bark colored thin, elastic and brown - beige.

Bra d' alpeggio (DOP) is still produced in the mountainous communities of Cuneo entirely handmade. The production technique is very similar to that of Bra from the plane: It quite simple tools are still being used and the procedures are not mechanized. The bark is thin and elastic, white colored in the soft and beige or brown on hard type. The dough of the tenero is light beige, the duro of the straw.

Use

The Bra is part of the local pesto in Genoa, Piedmont, he is widely appreciated for its quality as a table or grated cheese. The Bra tenero accompany virtually all well-developed red wines pleasantly, for Bra duro adapts easily to full-bodied, aromatic and low acidity Pinot Gris.