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Cheese from Italy, Friuli Venezia Giulia

Formaggio Asìnoformadi salmistrà

A Friulian cow cheese that is salted and ripened by sinking it in a salmùerie, a brine of milk, skimmed cream and salt that is never replaced but aged for years in wooden vats. The classico is made from raw or thermised milk, cooked to 45–46 °C and pressed, and stays in the brine for months; the morbido is made from pasteurised milk, neither cooked nor pressed, and stays about 20 days.

Fully documentedCheese20 daysPAT (Friuli Venezia Giulia)Family: White brined cheese family (Feta PDO as template)

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedThe sheets give no amounts. The brine is never made afresh; it is kept and aged in wooden vats. A classico is 30–40 cm across and 5–7 cm high (sometimes 12–15 cm); a morbido is a 20 cm square, 5 cm high.
Whole cow milkRaw or thermised (classico); pasteurised (morbido)[ersa-asino][onaf-asino]
Natural milk starter or selected local cultures (optional)[ersa-asino]
Calf rennet[onaf-asino]
SalmùerieA brine of milk, skimmed cream and salt; the university study names whey, salt, milk and cream[ersa-asino][biasutti2006]
Starteroptional natural milk starter (lattoinnesto) or selected local cultures

Total time across the recorded steps: 20 days

Start
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What changes: Starting material: whole cow milk, raw, thermised or pasteurised

Step 1 of 7
Prepare the milk
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Raw or thermised for the classico, pasteurised for the morbido. A natural milk starter or selected local cultures may be added. Output: whole cow 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

A Friulian cow cheese that is salted and ripened by sinking it in a salmùerie, a brine of milk, skimmed cream and salt that is never replaced but aged for years in wooden vats. The classico is made from raw or thermised milk, cooked to 45–46 °C and pressed, and stays in the brine for months; the morbido is made from pasteurised milk, neither cooked nor pressed, and stays about 20 days. Made in 7 steps over 20 days. The longest step, salt and ripen in the salmùerie, takes at least 20 days (ERSA (Agenzia regionale per lo sviluppo rural…).

Key numbers
Main stepat least 20 daysReported[ersa-asino]Salt and ripen in the salmùerie
Temperature34–38 °CReported[onaf-asino]Add rennet

What makes this one different

Most brined cheeses sit in salt water. Asìno ripens in a brine of milk, cream and salt that is never replaced, so the brine grows richer in fat and aroma from year to year and passes them to each new batch of cheeses.

Types
Classico, a pressed semi-cooked wheel ripened months in the brine; morbido, a soft square ripened about 20 days
Size
Classico 30–40 cm across, 5–7 cm high (12–15 cm in some cases); morbido a 20 cm square, 5 cm high
Brine
Milk, skimmed cream and salt, never renewed, aged in wooden vats

Related ferments

Variants

  • Asìno morbidoPasteurised milk, very coarse curd, not cooked or pressed, about 20 days in the brine.
  • Asìno classicoRaw or thermised milk, walnut-size curd, cooked to 45–46 °C, pressed, months in the brine.

Safety

The classico may be made from raw milk. ANSES advises pregnant women, people over 65, people with weak immunity and young children to avoid raw-milk cheeses. The regional sheet records a waiver that lets the wooden vats be used.

History and sources

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

ERSA says the first certain record is in Enrico Palladio's Rerum Foroiuliensium of 1659, which takes the name from the village of Asio. A bishop of Concordia wrote in 1749 to secure his supply, and price lists of 1775 and 1812 include it.

Microbes
No study we found names its microbes.
  1. [ersa-asino] ERSA (Agenzia regionale per lo sviluppo rurale, Friuli Venezia Giulia), prodotti tradizionali, 'Formaggio Asìno' with its waiver sheet (page saved 19/8/2017, copy hosted by ONAF)gov
  2. [onaf-asino] ONAF (Organizzazione Nazionale Assaggiatori Formaggi), technical sheet 'Formaggio Asìno' (PAT Friuli Venezia Giulia)web
  3. [biasutti2006] Biasutti M., Innocente N. 2006, Effect of a post-processing phase on the volatile flavour compounds of Asino cheese, Italian Journal of Food Science 18(2):163-176 (abstract in the University of Udine repository)paper
  4. [anses2022] ANSES 2022, Fromages au lait cru, quels risques pour la santé et comment mieux les prévenir (8 April 2022)gov