Caciocavallo

Caciocavallo is a ripe cheese made of fun milk pastry, derived from the mixture of cow milk, rennet, milk enzymes and salt.

Caciocavallo is made of certified milk in conformity with CEE regulations in force.
There is a quality control at once into the cheese factory, during the production cycle and, at the end when the product is finished, in order to guarantee the quality of it.

First step of the manufacturing process: pasteurised milk is warm at 37° C up and immersed in polyvalent tanks where, to favour lactic fermentation, milk enzymes (which have been incubate for about half an hour) are then added. Milk is constantly mixed by a mechanical arm and only after the addition of rennet it stands for a 10- 15 minutes to reach the appropriate consistency.

At this point the curdled milk reach the breaking off so that we obtain many grain of pastry of the same size of a grain of rice (in order to obtain mozzarellas reference point of bigness is about the same of a hazelnut).
After that the pastry cooks in order to reach consistency.
 

The curdled we obtain is then put into tanks, where it reaches a fermentation of a PH 5.10.
Now pastry "is going stringy", it is ready to be cut thinly and stringed in boiled water.

The pastry we have obtained is send directly to moulding process.

The moulding machine collects the pastry in its alimentation canals,
controlled by the head dairyman and send to moulds.

 

The pastry is divided in the right quantity into moulds, in order to assure the same weight of finish products.

The women, who work there, will finish caciocavallo and, with clever movements give shape of a "goatee", which characterize the typical shape of caciocavallo agnonese.
Afterwards there is moulding of caciocavallo’s "head", by a hand-made process.

The "full cheese" we obtain are now stiffed with a natural fibre string and then put into a tank with cold water where the product lay for about two hours in hardening.

Successively they are immersed in tanks with pickle, which guarantee the conservation, the consistency and sapidity of products.

The times of this phase depend on the weight of the product (a caciocavallo of 1,3 Kilos takes about 8 hours, one of 2 Kilos lay there for 16 hours to enable salt to reach the "heart" of the product).

 

Full cheeses pulled out from pickle are then transferred into a drying room, where they are disposed in trolley with wood or steel trestle. Here they go through a first drying to a high temperature (about 25° C and a 40% humidity) for a pair of days.
Subsequently they are sending in seasoning room, where they lay for a period of two months - one year
With a constantly ventilation in order to avoid the development of mould.

During the seasoning period, each product, which has acquired the quality characteristics that the cheese factory Director needs, obtains the signet of excellent product through branding iron.

Same process foresees the addition of truffle flakes or a smoking process to obtain Truffled or Smoked Caciocavallo.