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Cheese from Italy, Sardegna

Casu in filixiSu casu in filixi

Fresh raw goat or ewe milk is set at milking warmth with kid or lamb rennet paste in about half an hour. The uncut curd is ladled in thin layers between fern tips into a cloth-lined container, tied up and hung for a few hours to drain. It is not salted and is eaten within about two days, the fern pattern printed in the white curd.

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedThe sheets give no amounts. The finished discs are 15–20 cm across; total output is under 300 kg a year.
Raw whole goat or ewe milkSummer milk, June to August, just milked[pat-filixi][onaf-filixi]
Kid or lamb rennet paste[pat-filixi][onaf-filixi]
Fresh fern tips (soft shield fern, Polystichum setiferum)Cut, washed and dried before the make; considered toxic (see safety)[onaf-filixi]
No salt[onaf-filixi]

Total time across the recorded steps: 2.5 h

Start
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What changes: Starting material: fresh fern tips, washed and dried

Step 1 of 5
Pick and wash fern tips
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Tips of healthy fern fronds are cut, washed and left to dry before milking.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Fresh raw goat or ewe milk is set at milking warmth with kid or lamb rennet paste in about half an hour. The uncut curd is ladled in thin layers between fern tips into a cloth-lined container, tied up and hung for a few hours to drain. It is not salted and is eaten within about two days, the fern pattern printed in the white curd. Made in 5 steps over 2.5 h. The longest step, tie and hang to drain, takes at least 2 h (ONAF (Organizzazione Nazionale Assaggiatori F…).

Key numbers
Main stepat least 2 hReported[onaf-filixi]Tie and hang to drain
Temperature35 °CReported[onaf-filixi]Set with rennet paste

What makes this one different

The curd is never cut or salted. It is built up in thin layers between fern leaves, drained for a few hours and eaten within two days, so it is barely ripened at all.

Rind
None; milk-white, fern-imprinted
Size
Discs a few mm thick, 15–20 cm across; weight very variable

Related ferments

Safety

The milk is raw and the curd is not salted, so it is eaten within 36–48 hours or kept in the fridge. ONAF says the soft shield fern laid against the curd is considered toxic, which makes the cheese hard to sell. No source we read measures what passes from the fern into the curd, so this page records a tradition and is not a recipe to follow. ANSES advises pregnant women, people over 65, people with weak immunity and young children to avoid raw-milk cheeses.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

Herders made it in summer, when the milk is richest. Oral tradition says it has always existed, and the most recent written sources date from the early 1900s. A herder's fold is a one-room round hut (su pinnettu) with a conical roof of juniper or holm-oak beams covered with branches. The ferns helped the fresh curd drain so it could be eaten at once. It is now made only for home use or as a gift, under 300 kg a year, and in 2025 the PAT list renamed it "Casu in filixi – Formaggio in felce".

Starter
The sources we found do not say how its fermentation begins.
Microbes
No study we found names its microbes.
  1. [pat-filixi] Regione Autonoma della Sardegna, Assessorato dell'Agricoltura, Elenco prodotti agroalimentari tradizionali, scheda identificativa 'Casu in filixi (Formaggio in felce)' (copy hosted by ONAF)gov
  2. [onaf-filixi] ONAF (Organizzazione Nazionale Assaggiatori Formaggi), technical sheet 'Casu in filixi – Formaggio in felce', PAT Regione Sardegnaweb
  3. [onaf] ONAF, scheda formaggio 'Casu in filixi - Formaggio in felce' (id 367)web
  4. [anses2022] ANSES 2022, Fromages au lait cru, quels risques pour la santé et comment mieux les prévenir (8 April 2022)gov