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Fermentation Atlas

Cheese from Greece and Cyprus

KefalotyriΚεφαλοτύρι

Sheep or goat milk, or a mixture, is set with rennet, and the curd is cut and cooked to the mid-40s °C. The curd is pressed into flat wheels, brined and then dry-salted many times on the surface. It ripens at least three months into a hard, very salty and piquant cheese of 5–10 kg. Made in 5 steps over 3.1 months. The longest step, ripen at least three months, takes at least 3 months (Bosnea L 2025) and runs at 4–16.5 °C (Bosnea L 2025). Salt is 20 % (Bosnea L 2025). Streptococcus thermophilus and Lactococcus lactis and Lactic acid bacteria do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main stepat least 3 monthsSet[bosnea2025]Ripen at least three months
Temperature4–16.5 °CReported[bosnea2025]Ripen at least three months
Salt20 %Reported[bosnea2025]Brine, then dry-salt the surface many times
AciditypH 4.8–5.5Reported[bosnea2025]Ripen at least three months
Fully documentedCheese3.1 monthsnone (Greek food code sets its salt and minimum ripening; not a PDO)Family: Hard pressed ewe cheese family (Manchego and Pecorino Romano as templates)More hard sheep and goat cheesesMore from GreeceMore from Cyprus

Recipe

Amounts from a sourceNo fixed recipe; the amounts are from one semi-industrial make of 700 L of thermised sheep milk per vat (Bosnea et al. 2025).
Sheep or goat milk, or a mixture · Raw in artisanal making; pasteurised or thermised (65 °C for 30 s in one make) in dairies[bosnea2025]
Starter cultures · None or a natural starter in artisanal making; commercial or native cultures in dairies[bosnea2025]
Rennet · Natural or commercial[bosnea2025]
20 % brine, then 50 g coarse salt per face, six timesSalt · Brine and dry salt in one semi-industrial make[bosnea2025]
Starternone, natural or commercial; one study used native Streptococcus thermophilus and Lactococcus lactis

Total time across the recorded steps: 3.1 months

Start
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35 °CpH 6.5–6.5shapes, not to countS. thermophilusLactococcus lactisLactic acid bacteria

What changes: Starter and rennet go into warm sheep milk and it sets in about half an hour

Step 1 of 5
Warm the milk, add starter and rennet
Time
35 min
Reported
Temperature
35 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
pH 6.5–6.5
Measured
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
S. thermophilus
Lactococcus lactis
Lactic acid bacteria

Output: coagulum.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
firm gel
Colour
white

Microbes at work in this step

starter bacteria begin to sour the milk; rennet sets it

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

What makes this one different

Kefalotyri is a cooked, pressed, heavily salted hard cheese. Its many dry saltings bring the salt above 3 %, more than in Graviera. Recipes vary so much from region to region that it has no PDO, unlike Kefalograviera.

Milk
Sheep, goat or a mixture; sometimes cow milk
Ripening
At least 3 months (Greek law)
Composition
Mean of 17 market cheeses — pH 5.3, moisture 36.8 %, salt 3.1 %, fat in dry matter 49.2 %

Related ferments

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

  1. [bosnea2025] Bosnea L., Kosma I., Kakouri A., Paramithiotis S., Samelis J. 2025, Development of a semi-industrial Kefalotyri-type cheese using thermized milk from native Epirus sheep breeds and autochthonous starter and adjunct cultures, Fermentation 11:673, doi:10.3390/fermentation11120673paper
  2. [pappa2023] Pappa E.C., Kondyli E. et al. 2023, Compositional differences of Greek cheeses of limited production, Foods 12:2426, doi:10.3390/foods12122426paper
  3. [kamilari2022] Kamilari E., Tsaltas D., Stanton C., Ross R.P. 2022, Metataxonomic mapping of the microbial diversity of Irish and Eastern Mediterranean cheeses, Foods 11:2483, doi:10.3390/foods11162483paper