European PDO cheeses

Cheese is probably one of the products that we use more than any other in our diet.

How many of us have not enjoyed excellent salads with cheese on top, like a traditional village salad?

How many times haven’t we spent nights with friends at home serving a wonderful wine with a variety of cheeses?

And of course, how many times our grandmother haven’t made our favorite traditional cheese pie on Sunday to eat with our family at the table?

Wherever we look in our daily diet but also in our most special moments, cheese is a key component of our gastronomic tradition.

European cheeses are admittedly one of the best dairy products, products in which Europe has a long gastronomic history and tradition.

The great variety in both the quality and the taste characteristics of the European PDO and PGI cheeses has to do with the special local diet that the animals follow, the soil that determines the quality of the food, and the specific traditional methods !!

Let’s see together some of the European PDO cheeses below and get to know them.

European Anevato cheese:

Anevato is a soft white cheese made from sheep’s or goat’s milk.
The origin of the milk used for the ascendant must be exclusively from the animals that grow and are raised in the areas of Grevena and the province of Voio in the prefecture of Kozani (which today, practically, is identified with the Municipality of Voio). In the same area, apart from the origin of the milk, the preparation of the cheese must also take place.

Anevato is a cheese with a characteristic light taste, a sour taste and a strong element of coolness and freshness.

This is a table cheese that can be used comfortably as a spread or with oily foods.

European PDO Galotyri:

Galotyri is a soft cheese with a creamy texture, without skin, with a sour, pleasant, and cool taste, as well as a rich aroma. It is produced from sheep’s milk or goat’s milk or a mixture thereof and is consumed as table milk. It is one of the oldest European cheeses and a PDO product since 1996.

European PDO Graviera Agrafa:

One of the best graviera cheese , with maturity that exceeds six months. Extremely balanced taste and velvety spicy notes.

Awarded with a quality award, it will accompany white wines with rich body and acidity. A nice cheese with rich taste and aromas of the flora of the mountain of the same name, made with sheep’s milk that may have part of goat.

European PDO Graviera of Crete:

A hard yellow cheese made from sheep’s milk, to which a maximum of 20% goat’s milk can be added. The milk used on production should come from the milk of animals raised in Crete. Intense spicy taste with characteristic freshness. An ideal cheese to use in food, along with wines, along with honey and with any other tasty combination you prefer.

European PDO Naxos Graviera:

Hard cheese, with the pale yellow color, the thin, dry skin, the solid elastic mass, the characteristic small scattered holes, the fine aroma, the sweet and delicate taste and the very characteristic aftertaste.

European PDO Lemnos Kalathaki:

Delicious, white cheese, preserved in brine and made from goat’s and sheep’s milk is produced in the area of ​​Lemnos.

European PDO Kaseri cheese:

The semi-hard white-yellow cheese from sheep or, as the case may be, a mixture of sheep’s milk and a minimum of goat’s milk. Nice, semi-hard cheese with mild taste that is made mainly with sheep’s milk.

European PDO Katiki Domokou:

A special cheese with a creamy texture made from goat’s and sheep’s milk in the area of ​​Domokos.

European PDO Kefalograviera:

It is a hard traditional cheese made from sheep’s milk with a salty taste and rich aroma, sometimes with the mixture of goat, with the latter being contained in a percentage of less than 10% by weight. It is often used when making saganaki (that is, we cut it into triangular pieces, dip it in seasoned flour and fry it lightly). It is similar to kefalotyri and sometimes replaces it.

European PDO Kopanisti:

Kopanisti is a spicy cheese, an ointment made with cow’s sheep or goat’s milk. Kopanisti was created by the need of the locals to make cheese in conditions that in the old days it was not possible to preserve their cheese.

European PDO Ladotyri limnou:

It is produced from pasteurized goat’s and sheep’s milk, matures for at least three months and belongs to the category of hard cheeses. Produced exclusively on the island of Lesvos, it has a light yellow color and has a spicy taste, with a special aroma, leaving a pleasant full aftertaste with a strong personality.

European PDO Manouri:

It belongs to the category of white, soft cheeses without skin but with a compact structure. After filtration, heating with constant stirring, the whey collected at the top of the cauldron is placed in special fabric molds where it is drained for 4–5 hours so that the manouri gets its characteristic cylindrical shape. The cheese is then transported to cold storage rooms until it is placed on the market.

European PDO Metsovone:

It is a semi-hard, smoked cheese that comes from Metsovo, from where it got its name, and where another well-known cheese is produced, the metsovela. It is a cheese of Protected Designation of Origin. It is smoked hanging, wrapped in a rope, with the method of Pasta filata, while it matures for about three months. It is prepared mainly from cow’s milk or a mixture of cow’s milk with sheep or goat (but not more than 20%). It is usually accompanied by white wines, while it is used in salads or as part of appetizers.

European PDO Batzos:

Batzos is a traditional brine cheese, semi-hard to hard, white to white-yellow, without skin, with irregular holes throughout the cheese mass. It is a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) according to ministerial decision 313057/94.

It is made from goat’s and sheep’s milk and has a pleasant sour, slightly spicy and very salty taste.

Batzos is consumed baked in the pan or on the grill, grated on pasta, in salads and meals and fried in eggs.

European PDO Xinomyzithra:

Xinoutsiko cheese made from sheep’s or goat’s milk or a mixture of both Area.

European PDO Curd:
Yogurt, sour cheese from sheep’s or goat’s milk or a mixture of both.

European PDO San Michalis:
Special cheese with a spicy taste made only from cow’s milk.

European PDO Feta:
And of course feta cheese!! Feta is a white cheese made from goat’s and sheep’s milk, which matures in brine. It was finally approved as a PDO product only in 2002, after adventures and appeals mainly from Denmark and France. To be called a Feta PDO cheese, it must meet certain conditions:

It is prepared only from Greek pasteurized goat’s and sheep’s milk, in a ratio of at least 70% sheep and goat up to 30%.
Use milk only from Greek sheep breeds, which feed on the local flora of each area, mainly in free range. n Produced from October to mid-June.
Contains minimum fat 43% on dry and maximum moisture 55%.
Mature for at least 2 months in wooden barrels or tin cans (tins).

European PDO Sfela:

Sfela is a traditional cheese made in the southern Peloponnese in the prefectures of Messinia and Laconia. Its name is due to the way the cheese mass is cut (Sfela = strip). Sfela is made exclusively from 100% Greek, pasteurized goat’s and sheep’s milk, which comes strictly only from the region of Messinia.

Sfela is a semi-hard brine cheese with a slightly salty and spicy taste. It matures for at least three months before being on your table.

European PDO Formaella:

The famous formaela Arachova is a delicious pale yellow cheese, with a protected designation of origin, produced from goats and sheep grazing on Mount Parnassos. It takes its special cylindrical shape from the wicker baskets made of wicker wood, in which it is placed for its maturation, forming a hard natural crust.

It has an elastic texture, a moderately salty taste and a spicy aftertaste that stands out when cooked.

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