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Cheese from Spain, Asturias

Queso de Porrúaquesu de Porrúa

A simple fresh cheese of eastern Asturias, once sold at coastal markets. Cow milk, or sheep or goat milk in spring and early summer, is set with rennet, cut small and lightly pressed, then rubbed with salt on both faces. The ministry catalogue describes it as fresh and unripened, soft, moist and mild, with a pH of about 6; it names cultures only for pasteurised milk, so little fermentation is documented.

Fully documentedCheese3 daysTraditional cheese, listed in the Spanish ministry's cheese catalogueFamily: Uncooked or semi-cooked pressed cheese family (tomme, Saint-Nectaire, Reblochon, Morbier, Raclette)

Recipe

Queso de Porrúa, a photo from Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Sitomon, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
No fixed amounts recordedTraditional cheese with no fixed recipe. The ministry catalogue gives about 0.5 kg per cheese; a 2007 book describes one Porrúa maker's fresh cheese as about 300 g.
Cow, sheep or goat milk, or a mixRaw or pasteurised[mapa-catalogo]
Lactic culturesOnly when the milk is pasteurised[mapa-catalogo]
Rennet[mapa-catalogo]
Salt (sodium chloride)Rubbed on both flat faces[mapa-catalogo]
Starterlactic cultures, added only when the milk is pasteurised

Total time across the recorded steps: 3 days

Start
Drag the bar or press Play

What changes: Starting material: cow milk, or sheep or goat milk in spring

Step 1 of 5
Warm the milk
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Farms were mixed, mostly cattle with a few sheep and goats, so most cheese was cow milk, with sheep or goat cheese in spring and early summer.

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 simple fresh cheese of eastern Asturias, once sold at coastal markets. Cow milk, or sheep or goat milk in spring and early summer, is set with rennet, cut small and lightly pressed, then rubbed with salt on both faces. The ministry catalogue describes it as fresh and unripened, soft, moist and mild, with a pH of about 6; it names cultures only for pasteurised milk, so little fermentation is documented. Made in 5 steps over 3 days. The longest step, cut and drain in the mould, takes 3 days (Asociación de Queseros Artesanos (Asturias)). Salt is 2 % (Ministerio de Agricultura (MAPA) 2015).

Key numbers
Main step3 daysReported[aqa-porrua][wp-es]Cut and drain in the mould
Salt2 %Reported[mapa-catalogo]Rub with salt
AciditypH 6Reported[mapa-catalogo]Sell fresh

What makes this one different

Queso de Porrúa is a plain market cheese, only lightly pressed and salted on its faces. Its milk changes with the season, from cow milk most of the year to sheep or goat milk in spring.

Size
3–5 cm high, 8–10 cm across, about 0.5 kg; disc-shaped
Composition
40–45 % dry matter, 55–60 % moisture, about 50 % fat in dry matter, 2 % salt

Related ferments

Variants

  • De vacaCow milk, made all year.
  • De ovejaSheep milk, from about April to August (Wikipedia).

Safety

The ministry catalogue describes a fresh, unripened cheese with a pH of 6.0 and about 2 % salt, made from raw or pasteurised milk, with lactic cultures added when the milk is pasteurised. If the milk is raw, the CDC says people at higher risk, including pregnant women, people 65 or older and people with weak immunity, should avoid raw-milk cheese unless it is heated to 165 °F (74 °C) or until steaming hot.

History and sources

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

The ministry catalogue says it was a homemade cheese sold at the local markets of the eastern Asturian coast. Growing demand moved production into small specialised dairies. A 2007 book on the artisan cheeses of eastern Asturias describes a Porrúa maker, Emérita Romano, making the fresh cheese from cow milk of the La Mañanga pastures, with the marks of the mould on its surface, and notes that Porrúa cheeses also exist in cured cow and goat versions.

Microbes
No study we found names its microbes.
  1. [valle2007] Valle Poo F. 2007, Quesos artesanos de la comarca Oriente de Asturias (Monografías del Oriente de Asturias 1), Consorcio del Oriente de Asturias, pp. 44–45, chapter on Porrúabook
  2. [wp-es] Wikipedia (es), «Queso de Porrúa» (outline only)wiki
  3. [aqa-porrua] Asociación de Queseros Artesanos (Asturias), «Quesería Porrúa», member page describing how the Porrúa cheese is madeweb
  4. [cdc-listeria] US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Preventing Listeria Infectiongov