The area of provenance and the working process of the milk include Piacenza’s province, in Emilia-Romagna and some others lands in Lombardia, Veneto and the province of Trento.
Characteristics of Provolone Valpadana
The provolone cheese was invented during the middle years of the XIX Century, through the conjunction of the “paste filate” cheese culture from the South of Italy and dairy vocation of the Po Valley.
Namely the Provolone is a semi-hard string cheese obtained by full cream cow’s milk. It’s produced in two different types: sweet and spicy. It’s also possible to obtain a smoked cheese.
Adding veal rennet (for the sweet version) and the lamb rennet (for the spicy one), the milk becomes curd cheese, after it string cheese, therefore it will come the time to shape the cheese through specific molds.
Ater the salting process in brine, the drying and the binding, the cheeses are ready for aging.
After some days and months or in certain cases more then a year, specific substances mature inside the cheese and new flavours are created: this is how sweet or spicy Provolone Valpadana Dop is born.
This cheese can have different shapes: the”salami”one is similar to a truncated cone; the “melon” or “pear” shapes can eventually have a little ball shape head.
The rind is thin and smooth, pale yellow, gold or sometimes yellow brown color.
Since 1996 the Provolone Valpadana was titled P.D.O. (“D.O.P.” Denominazione Origine Protetta), by the common law rules defining the characteristic of the products with a denomination of origin.
The Consortium, established in 1975, is based in Cremona, exactly in the center of the production area of the Provolone Valpadana.
