Branzi

Branzi is a pressed-cook, semi-hard cow's-milk cheese from the Branzi area of the Val Brembana, deep in the pre-Alps of Lombardy. It carries a DOP designation and is one of the few Italian alpine cheeses traditionally made with a small percentage of goat's or sheep's milk alongside the dominant cow's milk, a holdover from the era when sheep and goats grazed the same high pastures. A mature wheel aged for several months develops a piquant, almost meaty flavor that has long made it a favorite on the tables of Bergamo and the surrounding valleys.

The cheese is made between late spring and early autumn, when the cattle are taken to the alpine alpeggio. Milk is heated in copper vats over a wood fire, curdled with traditional rennet, broken by hand, and pressed into large wheel-shaped forms that can weigh up to fifteen kilograms. The wheels are dry-salted, then matured on wooden boards in cellars at the valley farms; younger wheels are mild and supple, while wheels aged for six months or more become firm, dense, and intensely savory.

Branzi is at its best shaved over warm polenta, melted into the local sciatt or casoncelli pasta, or served in thin slices with a glass of Valcalepio Rosso or a young Nebbiolo. Look for it at cheesemongers in Bergamo's Città Bassa, at the cheese stalls of Piazza Mercato delle Scarpe, and at sagre and dairy fairs in the Val Brembana. It is occasionally exported to specialty shops in Milan, Brescia, and Verona.