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Cheese from Italy, Calabria

Mozzarella silana

Mozzarella silana is a hand-made cow milk mozzarella from the Sila plateau in Calabria. The milk is set with kid rennet paste at 36–38 °C, the curd is broken to rice-grain size and semi-cooked at 40–42 °C, then left to sour for half a day and soaked about 24 hours in cold running water. It is stretched in wooden tubs with hot water and salted in brine.

Fully documentedCheese37 hPAT (Regione Calabria, product code F-09)Family: Pasta filata (stretched-curd) cheese family

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedThe regional sheet gives the method but no amounts. A mozzarella weighs about 250–300 g.
Cow milk[pat-sheet][onaf-sheet]
Kid rennet paste[pat-sheet][onaf-sheet]
Lactic starter culturesAdded to the milk with the rennet[onaf-sheet]
Salt (brine)[pat-sheet]
Starterlactic cultures (fermenti lattici) added to the milk with the rennet

Total time across the recorded steps: 37 h

Start
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36–38 °C

What changes: Kid rennet paste goes into the milk at 36–38 °C and sets it in about an hour

Step 1 of 7
Set the milk with kid rennet paste
Time
1 h
Reported
Temperature
36–38 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactic acid bacteria

Output: set curd.

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

Mozzarella silana is a hand-made cow milk mozzarella from the Sila plateau in Calabria. The milk is set with kid rennet paste at 36–38 °C, the curd is broken to rice-grain size and semi-cooked at 40–42 °C, then left to sour for half a day and soaked about 24 hours in cold running water. It is stretched in wooden tubs with hot water and salted in brine. Made in 7 steps over 37 h. The longest step, soak the slices in cold running water, takes 24 h (Regione Calabria 2005).

Key numbers
Main step24 hReported[pat-sheet][onaf-sheet]Soak the slices in cold running water
Temperature36–38 °CReported[pat-sheet][onaf-sheet]Set the milk with kid rennet paste

What makes this one different

The curd is semi-cooked at 40–42 °C, soured for half a day and then soaked about a day in cold running water before stretching. The ONAF sheet says its particularity among mozzarellas is kid rennet.

Rind
None; a smooth, shiny skin
Size
Rounded, about 10 cm across, about 250–300 g (ONAF gives up to 400 g)
Composition
Moisture 56%
Season
All year, mostly June to September

Related ferments

Safety

The regional notes name raw milk, tinned copper vats and wooden tools as the main hazards, with Staphylococcus aureus from raw milk. They advise checking the milk and, if needed, thermising or pasteurising it. The curd is stretched at 85 °C.

Hazards the sources name: Staphylococcus aureus, a risk named for raw milk in the regional safety notes.

History and sources

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

The ONAF sheet says the method is handed down within families or, more often, from one 'caporale' to the next, the head of a group of farm workers who processed the milk on the large farms of the region. It says documents show the cheese is more than 25 years old, at a dairy in Celico, Cosenza.

  1. [pat-sheet] Regione Calabria, Prodotti agro-alimentari tradizionali, product code F-09 'Mozzarella silana' (scanned sheet, 2005; copy hosted by ONAF)gov
  2. [onaf-sheet] ONAF (Organizzazione Nazionale Assaggiatori Formaggi), technical sheet 'Mozzarella silana'web
  3. [onaf] ONAF, cheese page 'Mozzarella silana' (id 1119)web