Skip to main content
Support

Browse by category

All categories
Home

Cheese from Italy, Veneto, province of Verona

Formaggio StraconStracon

Stracon is a semi-cooked, semi-hard summer cheese from the alpine pastures of the Verona mountains. Raw whole milk from a single milking is set with calf rennet at 37 °C, the curd is broken and semi-cooked at 45–48 °C, and the wheels ripen 50–60 days in cool, very humid rooms.

DocumentedCheese50 days – 2 monthsTraditional food product (PAT, Regione Veneto)Family: Uncooked or semi-cooked pressed cheese family (tomme, Saint-Nectaire, Reblochon, Morbier, Raclette)

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedThe source gives temperatures and times but no amounts. A wheel weighs about 6 kg.
Raw whole cow milk from one milkingMostly from Brown Swiss cows on alpine pasture; with natural or induced acidity[onaf-sheet]
Calf rennet, liquid or powder[onaf-sheet]
SaltRubbed on dry or as a brine bath[onaf-sheet]

Total time across the recorded steps: 50 days – 2 months

Start
Drag the bar or press Play

What changes: Starting material: raw whole milk from one milking, warmed in the cauldron

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

Output: raw whole milk at setting temperature.

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

Stracon is a semi-cooked, semi-hard summer cheese from the alpine pastures of the Verona mountains. Raw whole milk from a single milking is set with calf rennet at 37 °C, the curd is broken and semi-cooked at 45–48 °C, and the wheels ripen 50–60 days in cool, very humid rooms. Made in 7 steps over 50 days – 2 months. The longest step, ripen, takes 50 days – 2 months (ONAF (national organisation of cheese tasters)).

Key numbers
Main step50 days – 2 monthsReported[onaf-sheet][veneto-atlante]Ripen
Temperature37 °CReported[onaf-sheet][veneto-atlante]Set with calf rennet

What makes this one different

It is a summer alpine cheese made from a single milking of raw milk, semi-cooked at 45–48 °C and ripened about 50–60 days.

Rind
Clean, dry, slightly thick, yellow
Size
About 6.0 kg; diameter 20–25 cm, height 7–9 cm; faces irregular
Season
Made June to September in the high Lessinia

Related ferments

Safety

The cheese is made from raw milk and ripened only 50–60 days. Keep it in the fridge. ANSES advises pregnant women, young children, people over 65 and people with weak immunity not to eat raw-milk cheeses other than pressed cooked ones such as Gruyère or Comté, because of Listeria, Salmonella and Shiga-toxin E. coli.

History and sources

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

In Verona dialect the name means 'very tired', said of milk from cows on transhumance. Cheese made along the way was put in sacks or wicker baskets, with the whey draining onto the backs of pack animals. The name later passed to cheese from the high pastures, where cows walked far each day. Monastery account books in the State Archive of Verona show that this old type of cheese was given as payment for pasture rents.

  1. [anses2022] ANSES 2022, Fromages au lait cru, quels risques pour la santé et comment mieux les prévenir (8 April 2022)gov
  2. [veneto-atlante] Veneto Agricoltura, Atlante dei prodotti agroalimentari tradizionali del Veneto, 'Formaggio stracon' (one-page scheda, p. 389; products, area, history, production and ripening)gov
  3. [onaf-sheet] ONAF (national organisation of cheese tasters), technical sheet 'Formaggio Stracon'web
  4. [onaf] ONAF, scheda formaggio 'Formaggio Stracon' (id 1086)web