What the sources record about each of these so far.
ByaslagMongolia
Also called бяслаг, byasulag, biaslag.
Byaslag is a mild, unripened Mongolian cheese. Yak or cow milk is heated over a gentle fire and curdled by stirring in whey or yoghurt (tarag), so the curd is set mainly by acid and heat; it is then wrapped in cloth and pressed between boards until the whey is out. Lactic bacteria have been isolated from byaslag.
- Milk
- Yak or cow milk, raw or boiled
- Ripening
- Fresh, not ripened
- Heat the milk gently
- Curdle with whey or yoghurt
- Wrap and press between boards
Safety: One source says byaslag is made from raw or cooked milk, and the cheese is fresh and unripened. CDC advises pregnant women, adults over 65 and people with weak immunity to avoid cheese made from raw milk.
CabocScotland, Highlands
A rich Highland cheese made from double cream soured by lactic cultures, with no rennet. The soured cream is salted, pressed to drive out moisture, shaped into small logs and rolled in toasted pinhead oatmeal. The maker says it can be aged for up to six months.
- Milk
- Double cream from local cow milk, pasteurised
- Composition
- 58.5 g fat per 100 g; 0.5 g salt per 100 g (maker's label)
- Pasteurise and add cultures
- Sour to a firm set
- Salt and press out moisture
- Shape into logs and roll in oatmeal
- Age (optional)up to 6 months
Safety: Made from pasteurised milk and cream.
CașRomania
Also called caș, caş.
Caș is the fresh rennet curd made by setting sheep milk (or cow milk) with lamb or calf rennet and draining it in a cloth under a weight. It is the starting point for other Romanian cheeses; for brânză de burduf it is left unsalted in a fir tub for up to two weeks to sour before it is ground with salt.
- Milk
- Sheep milk, sometimes cow milk
- Ripening
- Fresh; soured up to two weeks when it is to become brânză de burduf
- Set the milk with rennet1 h · 32–35 °C
- Drain under a weight and break up
- Sour the caș (for brânză de burduf)up to 14 days
Safety: Caș is a fresh curd. The sources describe only warming the sheep milk to about 32–35 °C, with no pasteurising step, and for brânză de burduf the curd then sits unsalted for up to two weeks. ANSES, the French food safety agency, names Listeria, Salmonella and enterohaemorrhagic E. coli as the main hazards of raw-milk cheeses. It advises pregnant women, people over 65, people with weak immunity and young children not to eat raw-milk cheeses, except cooked pressed ones such as Comté.
- Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity, Ark of Taste, Bucegi Mountains brânză de burduf (Google Arts & Culture story)
- European Commission 2026, Publication of an application for registration of 'Brânză frământată de Teaca' (PGI), Official Journal of the European Union C/2026/2804, 19.5.2026
- BZI (Bună Ziua Iași), Cum să prepari un caș de oaie acasă, rețeta pas cu pas (home recipe article, read 2026-11-02)
- ANSES 2022, Fromages au lait cru, quels risques pour la santé et comment mieux les prévenir (8 April 2022)
ClaquebitouFrance, Burgundy
Also called quiaque-bitou (Burgundian).
A Burgundian fresh goat cheese. Goat milk is set by lactic souring, and the curd is only half drained, so it stays soft and wet in its whey. It is mixed with garlic and herbs such as parsley and chives and eaten fresh.
- Fat
- 45% fat, as quoted from a farm dairy guide
- Lactic set
- Half-drain
- Mix with garlic and herbs
CrowdieScotland, Highlands
Also called crowdie, Gruth Dhu (crowdie with cream, oatmeal and pepper).
Crowdie is a soft, crumbly fresh cheese from the Scottish Highlands. Cow milk was left to sour naturally, often with a little rennet, and the warmed curd was hung in muslin to drip, then salted. The crowdies in the 2018 Food Standards Scotland list are all marked pasteurised.
- Milk
- Cow milk, pasteurised today
- Ripening
- Fresh; shelf life about 14 days
- Sour the milk
- Warm the curd and hang it in muslin
- Salt, and sometimes add cream
- Eat fresh
Safety: Slow Food UK says raw-milk crowdie is not allowed in Scotland, because the cheese is moist and keeps only about 14 days, which leaves it open to pathogens. Food Standards Scotland's 2018 review of artisan cheeses says Scotland bans raw drinking milk but places no restriction on selling raw-milk cheese made to the hygiene rules. Every crowdie in the review's table of Scottish cheeses is marked pasteurised.
CuajadaSpain
Also called cuajada, queso cuajada, curdled milk (Spain), Colombian cuajada.
Cuajada is a boundary entry with little or no fermentation. In Spain it is curdled milk, a soft, semisolid dairy product; in Colombia it is a fresh, non-acid curd cheese. Neither is soured by bacteria, so both must be kept cold and eaten fresh.
- Milk
- Milk; skim UHT milk in one Spanish study
- Ripening
- Fresh; not ripened
- Set the milk into curd
- Keep cold and eat fresh
Safety: Cuajada is not acidified, so Listeria can grow in it. In a survey of fresh cheeses in Quindío, Colombia, Listeria monocytogenes was found in 55 of 103 cuajada samples. In a Spanish lab challenge test on cuajada made from UHT skim milk, Listeria added at about 4 log cfu/mL reached 8.3 log in 3 days at 10 °C, a temperature-abuse condition, in control samples without biopreservatives. Keep it cold and eat it fresh.
- Arqués J.L., Rodríguez E., Nuñez M., Medina M. 2008, Antimicrobial activity of nisin, reuterin, and the lactoperoxidase system on Listeria monocytogenes and Staphylococcus aureus in cuajada, a semisolid dairy product manufactured in Spain, Journal of Dairy Science 91:70–75, doi:10.3168/jds.2007-0133
- Jaramillo-Bedoya E., Trujillo-Alzate Y.A., Ocampo-Ibáñez I.D. et al. 2021, Surveillance of fresh artisanal cheeses revealed high levels of Listeria monocytogenes contamination in the Department of Quindío, Colombia, Pathogens 10:1341, doi:10.3390/pathogens10101341
Demi-sel (fresh salted cheese)France
Also called Demi-sel, fromage demi-sel, demi-sel cheese.
Demi-sel is a French fresh cow cheese, an unripened curd that is lightly salted and sold in small squares of about 100 g with about 40 % fat. French law reserves the name and defines it in an annex to the 2007 cheese decree. The decree's fromage blanc article says a fermented fromage blanc must have undergone mainly lactic fermentation, and that one sold as fresh must hold live flora when sold; that article names demi-sel only as an exception to its dry-matter allowance.
- Milk
- Cow milk
- Legal status
- Named in the decree's fromage blanc article; unlike other fromages blancs it may not use the lower dry-matter minimum that French law allows for fromage blanc, because the annex defines it separately
- Fat
- About 40 % (French Wikipedia)
- Size
- About 100 g, square (French Wikipedia)
Made like Fresh lactic (acid-set) cheese family.
Formaggio ZigherItaly, Veneto
Raw whole cow or goat milk is soured, and the soured milk is separated in a cloth into curd and whey. The curd is kneaded several times with chives or other herbs, salt and ground pepper, shaped into small cones of about 150 g and dried in the open air. It is sold at once, after about a week for the table, or kept longer in a cellar for grating.
- Size
- Small cone, about 150 g
- Rind
- None; a mould bloom when mature
- Let the milk sour
- Separate in a cloth
- Knead with herbs, salt and pepper
- Shape and air-dry
- Sell or ripen7 days
Safety: The milk is raw and soured, and the sheets describe no heat treatment and give no pH or salt level. The CDC advises people who are pregnant, aged 65 or over or immunocompromised to avoid unheated fresh soft cheeses and any cheese made with raw milk, because of Listeria (CDC).
Queso llaneroVenezuela, the llanos
A hard, salty cheese of the Venezuelan plains, slightly acid and earthy, good for grating. It is a separate cheese from queso guayanés and from the long-salted, thick-rinded queso de año.
- Milk
- The feature does not give the milk for queso llanero; it says most Venezuelan cheeses are now made from cow milk, and many are made from raw milk
- Character
- Hard, slightly acid and earthy, salty, good for grating
Made like Fresh lactic (acid-set) cheese family.
RequeixoSpain, Galicia
Also called leite trallado, leite tomado, leite mazado, leite callado.
Requeixo is a fresh, unsalted Galician curd of whole raw cow milk, soured by the milk's own bacteria and yeasts at room temperature for one to two days. The curd hangs in cloth sacks for some hours, and the draining time decides whether it ends up spoonable like yogurt or firm like fresh cheese. Some makers use rennet instead; no specification or study we found gives its numbers.
- Pour the raw milk
- Sour at room temperature24 h – 2 days · 20–22 °C
- Skim the cream (home method)
- Hang in cloth sacks
- Beat back the cream (home method)
Safety: Requeixo is made from raw milk, not boiled, soured at 20–22 °C for 24 to 48 hours and eaten fresh with no ripening (Slow Food). The US CDC says raw milk can carry germs such as Campylobacter, E. coli, Listeria, Brucella and Salmonella. The US CDC says people at higher risk of Listeria infection, including pregnant women, people 65 or older and people with weak immunity, should avoid cheese made from raw milk unless it is heated to 165 °F (74 °C) or until steaming hot.
RygeostDenmark, especially Funen
Also called rygeost.
Rygeost is a soft fresh cheese from Funen that is smoked for a few seconds. In a published home recipe, heated and cooled whole milk is mixed with buttermilk and a little rennet and left for 24 hours, and the cut curd drains for 5–7 hours. It is then smoked for 20–30 seconds over straw or wood chips topped with stinging nettles.
- Heat the milk and cool it80 °C
- Add buttermilk and rennet
- Leave to set24 h
- Cut and drain5–7 h
- Smoke briefly
Safety: No safety source specific to rygeost was found.
SnøfriskNorway
Also called Snøfrisk, Snofrisk, Snow fresh.
A fresh, white, spreadable cheese made by TINE from 80% goat milk and 20% cow cream, first sold for the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics. It tastes fresh and tangy with a mild goat character.
- Milk
- 80% goat milk and 20% cow cream
- Launched
- 1994, for the Lillehammer Winter Olympics
- Combine goat milk and cow cream
- Make the fresh cheese
- Pack
Zhazhik (Armenia)Armenia
Zhazhik is an Armenian home-made cottage cheese made from the whey of matsun (set sour milk) or from buttermilk. A travel guide lists it among the ways Armenian households reuse dairy by-products.
- Milk
- Matsun whey or buttermilk
Made like Fresh lactic (acid-set) cheese family.