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Food Categories
Parmesan: the prince of cheeses
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 Of all the Italian regions the one I most prefer is Emilia. The moment you enter it the cooking becomes delicious and elaborate, rich and delicate, the most refined in the worid. I think Emilian cooks must write their recipes in Latin, so their secrets will remain secrets, their procedures mysterious. There where the countryside is deeper you can stop by some wretched-looking sign and chance upon the university of cooking, the royal palace of baking and brewing. Here all traditional flavors are routed, all memories surpassed, every dish is an impromptu creation of the cook, who towers over the stove back there in his white chef's hat, and doesn't want you to order anything, only asks to be trusted, and he sends out marvellous compositions with names that sound like they've been made up on the spot. And every so often he raises is eyes to St. Pasquale (patron saint of the profession) asking to be forgiven for his presumption, but feeling once again that he has surmounted ten centuries of delectable cooking. And then you forget the worid. What's this pie made of to be so gold and white and to taste of turkey breast and butter and ham, of aromatic herbs and parmesan cheese? Thatts right, parmesan cheese, for that is the main ingredient in this providential region. By no accident this is its area of production, which includes the provinces of Parma, Reggio Emilia, Modena, Bologna and Mantua.
No one knows exactly when this cheese was invented but already in the accounts of great banquets held in the courts of Europe in the late Middle Ages its presence is frequently mentioned among the various courses. For that matter, if we thumb through ancient Italian and foreign cookbooks, from those by the noble humanist Platina to those by the famous Taillevent (born in 1326 and author of the oldest book of French cuisine) , the constant use of parmesan cheese will be found in all of them. There must have been a rare allegiance for centuries to this kind of cheese, and an even rarer constancy in its quality, if parmesan appears in dictionaries and on international markets as the prince of grating cheeses.
 Parmesan is produced by more than 1,600 cheese factories spread over the particular district, all very small and ciose together, and where no more than an average of 4 or 5 forms are produced a day. Each form weighs around 70 pounds and takes a half a ton of milk to make. In effect, parmesan is an exceptional cheese, difficult, requiring lengthy ageing and absolutely natural. The milk is not pasteurized nor treated with anti-fermentatives. Its transformation into parmesan cheese also has something unpredictable and elusive about it; every form has a particular microbic equilibrium of its own, depending on the fodder the cows are fed and on mysterious environmental elements. To be perfect, parmesan must be "sweet," and shouid have no sharp or harsh flavor, which springs from a mellow blend. This quality reaches its peak in the so-called settembrino (from September, the month the cheese is produced in). The parmesan that is manufactured during the winter, the vernengo, is harsher and sharper in flavor.
There are three secrets of success in making parmesan cheese:
- the high quality of the milk, which has suitable characteristics only in the specific area of production (marine or mountain pasture-lands provide excellent milk for making other cheeses, but not this one);
- the air of these provinces, whose particular humidity and ventilation are indispensible for the proper maturing of the cheese;
- the cheesemaker's art, handed down over the centuries. Watching it, the process of making parmesan looks easy, but it is a combination of a series of small, swift operations which in a half an hour establish the fate of the form, its quality and its value.
For these reasons, parmesan cheese is inimitable. It doesn't take an expert to tell the difference between true and false parmesan, just a taste is enough. The ageing ranges from 12 to 36 months, depending on the category (new, up to 18 months; old, up to 24; very old, up to 36) and allows no way for the process to be shortened: forced ventilation or temperatures would ruin everything.
In order to survive for such long periods of time, the forms have to be perfect from every point of view. One of the commonest problems is the cracking of the cheese paste, which alters the flavor, and the air bubbles that can form inside. To check the results of the forms, the men from the Consortium who protect the genuineness of parmesan go and make inspections in the ageing barns. Each form is tapped with a mallet, and if something is wrong, if the cheese inside has cracked or is swollen, the form does not give off the right sound and is therefore discarded, demoted. If, instead, the sound is right, the form is branded with an oval marking, which the buyer shouid al ways be on the look-out for. According to its quality, established by tapping, the cheese is classified as select, zero, one, two, three.
But actually parmesan is nothing but the highest quality variety of that typical cheese of the Po Valley known as grana padano.
Grana padano is the twin brother of parmesan. They are so similar that at first sight there is no telling them apart. Then you begin to notice certain slight differences. The designation of the two cheeses is clearly spelled out on the rind, moreover grana is slightly lighter in color than parmesan and its consistency is softer and more hum id (less aged). The difference in flavor is also there and anyone who knows his cheeses would compare parmesan to great vintage wine and grana to a good red wine. This slight difference in quality is due to certain slight differences in they way they are treated, in the fodder and in the lesser ageing. Grana has one great thing to its credit: if it didn't exist to meet all the demands of the market, a sprinkle of parmesan on your pasta would cost more than a slice of truffle.
Grana is produced in great quantities over a vast area of Northern Italy along the Po valley, excluding the special parmesan provinces. The processing takes place in 22 gallon copper vats, that is the quantity necessary for obtaining two forms of cheese, with the addition of natural lactic ferments in whey and of powdered veal rennet.
As with parmesan cheese, there is a "Consortium for the protection of Grana Padano," whose job is to keep an eye on production and commerce. The mark stamped by the cheese-maker on the freshly-made forms guarantees their origin and genuineness as well as making it possible to identify the producing company. The "Grana Padano" seal branded on the rim of the form indicates its having met quality standards and is applied only after it has aged. The ageing of a form ranges from 14 to 18 months.
How much parmesan cheese is consumed in Italy? All you have to do in this respect is to consider that one of the most obvious proofs of the unity of Italy, long before it became a political fact, the phenomenon that really makes it one country, is to be found in the ceremony in which, at noon of every God-given day, in all the kitchens of the land, of peasants and the well-to-do, in convent-schools and monasteries, in eating-houses and deluxe restaurants, from the Alps to the shores of Sicily, pasta is thrown into boiling water. And this single, fundamental food has one natural appurtenance of its own: parmesan cheese. The sauce can change, but not the parmesan... except, of course, for certain praiseworthy exceptions which, after all, are part and parcel of life itself. Not only, but freshly grated parmesan lends its touch to countless egg dishes, to soups and baked vegetables and the wonderfully delicate risottos of Piedmont and Lombardy. You can slice it thinly into mushroom salads or on top of carpaccio , that Venetian specialty based on transparent slices of raw beef, and country folk, who haven't lost a fondness for down-to-earth, homegrown flavors, like eating it just as it is, in the company of friends and with a bottle of good red wine. And Italy is not the only place it has a following. The famous Pellaprat, the most recent master of "L'art culinaire moderne," writes that "le parmesan est apprecie dans le monde entier" and uses it as an ingredient in many of his recipes.
An international jury of the most distinguished connoisseurs recently awarded this hard, flavorsome cheese, true testing-ground for all wines of true excellence, the Grand Prix in the category of hard cheeses and the First Absolute Grand Prix among all the cheeses in the worid.
Amalita Pacelli
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