The art of milk processing is widespread throughout Italy, from the buffalo mozzarella from Aversa to parmesan cheese. However, we want to tell you about it through a ritual often repeated in Campania That tastes like summer.

From an early age, those from the Neapolitan and Salerno provinces who head to vacation areas to reach the nearest beaches know that along the road leading to the wonderful Cilento, one cannot help but stop to take advantage of the magnificent green areas where cows have always been raised and grazed and, in particular, starting in the Battipaglia area, buffaloes.

In dairies, the art of milk takes new life and form and is transformed into cheese, yogurt, ice cream. Many masters of the dairy art provide the store for retail sale, others entire areas of their estates or farms.

Stopping at these places to savor the products that make milk their raw material is not only a gastronomic experience but above all a way to rediscover the taste of small things.

That encounter with simple foods is part of that large family of actions and habits we call roots.

A recent story on milk, straight from the Cilento region

Chirico Dairy is one of the most famous producers in the mozzarella in the mortella

Muzzarella co' a mortedda or int'a' murtedda is a typical cheese from the central area of Cilento.

Where Mozzarella comes from in the mortella

At one time there were no refrigerators and no wrappers were used, but throughout the Cilento region there was myrtle, a plant with smooth, non-porous leaves that was perfect for packing fresh cheese.

So-called "mozzarella bunches" were sold: inside each bunch (of about 100 grams) were ten tongues of cheese.

The myrtle acts excellently as a natural cover and at the same time transfers very distinctive aromas and scents to the dough.

Myrtle in Cilento is called mortella and mozzarella prepared in this way is eaten fresh, after a maximum of 5 days. It is a table cheese, suitable as an appetizer, served with olives, tomatoes, pickles, seasoned with extra virgin and a little oregano.

A Family History

Entire families live to perpetuate the traditions associated with milk processing, from generation to generation, they pass on secrets and an approach to life proper to those who have made these productions an art, through a healthy and dedicated life of work.

See what milk has meant to Silvia Chirico, a cheesemaker who enhances Gelato through the flowers of her local area.

Milk processing, a craft that comes from afar

Among all peoples, milk has always had an economic and religious function; Jews, for example, measured the landowner's fortune by the amount of milk his flocks produced.

It may surprise you to know that in the beginning, horses were predominantly bred in Europe, which is why the Finnic peoples and Germans were called "Hippomolgoi" by the Greeks. , mungi mares, because they made use of horse milk.

When the peoples finally settled it was the Greeks who practiced the art of cheese-making on a permanent basis. The stores where milk was processed to make cheese were called Turopia, as reported to us by Marcus Terentius Varro , a Roman literary, grammarian, military, and agronomist, in his "De Re Rustica."

The Romans then learned the dairy technique at the Greek colonies in southern Italy that they conquered.

Milk and cheese were, after all, ubiquitous ingredients in all their dishes as evidenced by the recipes in "De Coquinaria" written by Sulpicius, a psedudonym of Emperor Tiberius.

During the Middle Ages, cheese production moved to the villages, then moved back to the plains during the age of the communes.

In the second half of the 1,800s, the dairy industry developed throughout Europe due to the gradual improvement in the technical nature of processing methods, e.g., the introduction of skimming machines, and the first schools of animal husbandry and dairy were born.