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Cheese from Armenia, Georgia

Chechilչեչիլ

Skimmed cow milk is left to sour, then set and heated with stirring until the curd pieces stick together and can be pulled into threads by hand. The threads are coiled, cooled and tied into rope-like bundles of white, salty cheese that smells of cultured milk; a smoked form also exists.

Fully documentedCheese5 min – 10 minFamily: Pasta filata (stretched-curd) cheese family

Recipe

Chechil, a photo from Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Valen1988, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
No fixed amounts recordedThe Georgian specification gives no amounts; a finished bundle weighs 0.5–3 kg. Its salt figure (4–8 %) sits in a block headed for Megruli sulguni, so it is not used here.
Skimmed cow milkRipened to 45–50 °T acidity before setting, in the Georgian specification[meskh-spec]
SaltThe finished cheese tastes quite salty[meskh-spec]
StarterIn Armenia the milk is soured, with salt or vinegar added by some households to speed it, and sometimes it curdles on its own without a ferment (Harutyunyan 2025)

Total time across the recorded steps: 5 min – 10 min

Start
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Milk proteinGel (curd)

What changes: Skimmed cow milk is left to sour before it is set

Step 1 of 5
Let the skimmed milk sour
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

In Armenia the cheese is made from sour milk; some households add salt or vinegar to sour it faster, and sometimes the milk curdles on its own without a ferment (Harutyunyan 2025). Output: soured skimmed milk.

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

Skimmed cow milk is left to sour, then set and heated with stirring until the curd pieces stick together and can be pulled into threads by hand. The threads are coiled, cooled and tied into rope-like bundles of white, salty cheese that smells of cultured milk; a smoked form also exists. Made in 5 steps over 5 min – 10 min. The longest step, set the curd, takes 5–10 min (Ministry of Agriculture of Georgia 2012) and runs at 38–40 °C (Ministry of Agriculture of Georgia 2012).

Key numbers
Main step5–10 minSet[meskh-spec]Set the curd
Temperature38–40 °CSet[meskh-spec]Set the curd

What makes this one different

Chechil is made from skimmed milk that is soured before setting, so the curd stretches at a low 38–40 °C in the Georgian rules. It is pulled into threads and tied into ropes, not shaped into balls like most pasta filata cheeses.

Milk
Skimmed cow milk
Size
0.5–3 kg rope-like bundles

Related ferments

Variants

  • Smoked chechilThe same cheese, smoked.
  • Meskhuri chechili (Georgia)The Georgian GI form, from fat-free cow milk in Samtskhe-Javakheti.
  • Civil peyniri (Erzurum)Turkish registered relative from skimmed cow milk soured to 22 °SH, set with rennet, then heated to 60–65 °C while the curd is kneaded, stretched and hung on racks.

Safety

In 15 household Cecil cheeses from Erzurum, the Turkish form of this cheese, Staphylococcus aureus averaged 6.4 x 10^2 cfu/g and was not detected in 46.66 % of samples. Coliform bacteria were below 10 cfu/g in 86.66 % of samples (Dikbaş 2010).

Hazards the sources name: Staphylococcus aureus (mean 6.4 x 10^2 cfu/g, not detected in 46.66 % of samples) and coliform bacteria (mean 8.5 x 10^1 cfu/g in the positive samples), in the same Erzurum Cecil cheeses.

History and sources

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

Harutyunyan (2025) records that in the past Armenian families plaited chechil into a white braid and sent it to the bride as a holiday gift. Georgia registered Meskhetian Chechili as a geographical indication on 24 January 2012. TÜRKPATENT received the application for Erzurum civil cheese on 17 December 2007 and announced it in the Official Gazette of 6 February 2009.

  1. [meskh-spec] Ministry of Agriculture of Georgia, Meskhetian Chechili, geographical indication specification (Georgian registration no. 8, 24 January 2012), published by the UK governmentspec
  2. [harutyunyan2025] Harutyunyan H. 2025, Traditional Skills in Chechil Cheese-Making and Preservation Among Armenians, History and Culture (YSU) special issue 1, pp. 247–259 (abstract)paper
  3. [turkpatent116] TÜRKPATENT, Geographical indication No 116, Erzurum Civil Peyniri (application C2007/020, 17 December 2007)spec
  4. [dikbas2010] Dikbaş N., Şengül M., Ertugay M.F. 2010, Microbiological and compositional characteristics of Cecil cheese collected from households in Erzurum, Turkey, Asian Journal of Chemistry 22(1):483–491 (abstract, via the Atatürk University AVESIS record)paper
  5. [elmali2011] Elmalı G., Uylaşer V. 2012, Geleneksel gıdalardan çeçil peynirinin üretimi ve özellikleri (Production and properties of Cecil cheese, a traditional food), Uludağ Üniversitesi Ziraat Fakültesi Dergisi 26(1) (abstract)paper