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Cheese from Italy, Sicilia

CofanettoCaciocavallo Cofanaro

Raw milk from Cinisara cows and Valle del Belice ewes is set with lamb paste rennet at about 36 °C in a wooden vat, with no starter added. The curd is broken to rice size, held about 4 hours under hot whey, pressed flat and hung over a chestnut pole. Next day it is sliced, stretched in hot whey, pressed into a square block in a wooden form and brined 12 hours per kg.

Fully documentedCheese21 days – 12 monthsTraditional food product (PAT, Sicilia)Family: Pasta filata (stretched-curd) cheese family

Recipe

Amounts from a sourceThe sheet gives the rennet dose per 100 litres of milk but no batch size. A block weighs 2–10 kg.
Raw whole Cinisara cow milk70–80%From one or two milkings[pat-sheet]
Raw whole Valle del Belice ewe milk20–30%[pat-sheet]
Lamb paste rennet80 g per 100 L of milk[pat-sheet]
Hot whey (scotta)Left in the vat after making ricotta or cheese; used to cook and to stretch the curd[pat-sheet][onaf-sheet]
Salt (saturated brine)[pat-sheet]
No starterLactic bacteria come from the biofilm on the wooden vat and tools[onaf-sheet]
Starternone added; lactic bacteria from the wooden vat's biofilm

Total time across the recorded steps: 21 days – 12 months

Start
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What changes: Starting material: raw cow and ewe milk, filtered into a wooden vat

Step 1 of 9
Collect the milk
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Output: raw cow and ewe milk from one or two milkings.

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

Raw milk from Cinisara cows and Valle del Belice ewes is set with lamb paste rennet at about 36 °C in a wooden vat, with no starter added. The curd is broken to rice size, held about 4 hours under hot whey, pressed flat and hung over a chestnut pole. Next day it is sliced, stretched in hot whey, pressed into a square block in a wooden form and brined 12 hours per kg. Made in 9 steps over 21 days – 12 months. The longest step, ripen, takes 20 days – 12 months (ONAF (national organisation of cheese tasters)).

Key numbers
Main step20 days – 12 monthsReported[onaf-sheet]Ripen
Temperature36 °CReported[pat-sheet]Set with lamb rennet

What makes this one different

A caciocavallo of mixed cow and ewe milk, made with wooden tools and no added starter. It is pressed into a square block like Ragusano, and its name comes from Monte Cofano.

Rind
Smooth with sharp corners; light straw when young, amber to brown and up to about 3 mm thick when aged
Size
Square-section block, 2–10 kg
Season
Made February to October

Related ferments

Safety

Made from raw milk with no added starter; the acid comes from the bacteria living on the wooden vat. The sheet asks for clean, healthy rooms and cool, ventilated cellars. The cheese ripens at least 20 days and may be eaten fresh. ANSES, the French food safety agency, links raw-milk cheese to 34 % of salmonellosis, 37 % of listeriosis and 60 % of enterohaemorrhagic E. coli outbreaks in France over ten years. It advises pregnant women, people with weak immunity, people over 65 and young children not to eat raw-milk cheeses, except pressed cooked cheeses such as Gruyère or Comté.

History and sources

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

The name comes from Monte Cofano in Custonaci. Both sheets say that, according to the writer Samuel Butler, the cheese goes back to the early 1500s.

Microbes
No study we found names its microbes.
  1. [pat-sheet] Regione Siciliana, Prodotti agroalimentari tradizionali della Regione Siciliana (2018), D.M. 16 February 2018, sheet 'Cofanetto o Caciocavallo Cofanaro'gov
  2. [onaf-sheet] ONAF (national organisation of cheese tasters), technical sheet 'Cofanetto'web
  3. [onaf] ONAF, cheese page 'Cofanetto' (id 1216)web
  4. [anses2022] ANSES 2022, Fromages au lait cru, quels risques pour la santé et comment mieux les prévenir (8 April 2022)gov