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Cheeses and derived milk products

Asturias possesses in its territory one of the biggest industries of cheesemakers in Europe. The official varieties reach the twenties: Los Beyos, La Peña, Porrúa, Peñamellera, Taramundi, Buelles, Valle del Narcea, Panes, Caso, Ovín, Afuega'l pitu, Pría, ValdesanoVaré, Los Oscos, Vidiago, Gamoneú, Cabrales and La Peral. All these cheeses have artisan quality, although the number of identified cheeses with name surpasses forty. Four of them, Cabrales, Gamonéu, Afuega'l pitu and Casín have Protected Denomination of Origin, DOP.

In their elaboration cow, sheep or goat milk , alone or mixed with each other is used . The resulting types of cheese are very varied, from soft and creamy to strong and spicy, smoky, fresh, of hard, soft or veined pasta, etc. Variety and guarantee of quality to satisfy any palate.

The Cabrales is possibly the maximum exponent of the Asturian gastronomy, together with the cider and the fabada. It has been endowed with DOP since 1981 and it is a cheese of strong flavor and scent, of blue pasta, elaborated with the base of cow, goat and sheep milk , and matured in caves, with a characteristic slightly spicy flavor.

The cheese of Gamonéu endowed with DOP since 2003 and has a lightly spicy flavor, buttery with an after taste of hazelnut.

The cheese of Afuega'l pitu endowed with DOP since 2003. It has a trunk shaped form of a colour between white and yellow And its flavor is slightly sour, little or non salted, creamy and quite dry and astringent. In some cases you can add to it paprika which contributes a characteristic reddish color. Its flavor is stronger and spicier.

The cheese Casín, one of the oldest of Asturias, obtained the DOP in 2006. It is elaborated using cow milk or with a mixture of this with sheep milk and goat milk , using a peculiar technique in the kneading of the curd: it is kneaded several times and always a single time per week, coinciding the last one with the waning moon. Of a potent and piercing aroma, its flavor is strong, persistent, spicy and slightly bitter at the end of the mouth. Its form is cylindrical-discoidal irregular, it has a yellow color creamy dark, almost brown, with some whitish tones and it is presented with one or the two faces recorded with different ornamental motifs or the name of the eloborator.

Next to this traditional cheesemaking industry has appeared, at the hands of multinationals in many cases, a great industry of derived milk products such as: the butter, the powdered milk, the yogourt and all kinds of desserts, together with other cheeses of industrial elaboration.