Are you ready to prepare the cheese of the roman countryside? Unique experience with a true Italian shepherd

Cheese Making in Rome Countryside

Have you ever seen how cheese is made? No? So this experience is for you. A true shepherd of the Roman countryside will show you all the procedures for turning good sheep’s milk into a delicious ricotta or a small “cacio“. Then it will be your turn. You will have to boil the milk, turn it, make it thicken, extract the soft dough from the pot, process it and turn it into cheese. Fear of getting dirty? Do not be afraid. A shepherd’s coat is ready for you! This is the Cheese Making in Roman Countryside.

The Making Cheese that we propose in this article has already been done by ourselves, along with other tourists from various foreign countries. This is not the usual demonstration you can find anywhere, but a part of real life of the Roman countryside.

Cheese Making with a true shepard!

Hosted in a farmhouse near Rome, a true shepherd awaits us. Not one that is improvised, but a professional one.

His flock is very numerous and grazes every day in the Prenestini Mountains, between Genazzano, Cave and Capranica Prenestina. In short, in the heart of the countryside of Rome.

Coming back to the “making cheese” that we made a few months ago, the sheperd was waiting for us with his pot already ready and full of milk. A big pot, of those used by the “witches” for their evil potions …

A large gas stove fed the flame under the pot that contained tens of liters of fragrant sheep’s milk.

The shepherd turned the milk with a long wooden stick. At this stage it takes patience, so that the milk thickens to extract the creamy “pasta” with which we will make the “ricotta” or “cacio” cheese. We did not have to be impatient …We was really doing cheese. Nothing artificial and ready.

So the shepherd gives us the stick and in turn we turned the milk …. more and more thick, more and more difficult to turn. But at the end we did it!

The sheperd turn off the fire and waits another bit of time to finish the thickening process. Then he puts his hands inside the milk and extracts a large ball of soft cheese.

Place the soft cheese on a wooden board and start to work it, a little as you do with homemade pasta during preparation.

We also do it …. we massage that cream of milk that slowly takes on consistency and finally we can put it in small pieces, inside the baskets.

Now that “ricotta” is ready. We just have to let it rest for a few hours.

In the meantime, we walk inside the farm, drinking a good Cesanese DOC wine and eating some delicious salami. Chatting friendly time flew and finally our “ricotta” was ready.

At dinner, between big laughs, we had the pleasure of eating a little as appetizer. Absolutely delicious!