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Cheese from Italy, Lazio

Marzolino o Marzolina

A small cheese of the southern Lazio mountains, mostly of goat milk but also of sheep, cow or mixed milk. The curd is set with lamb or kid rennet, broken to rice-grain size, put into small moulds, in most types without pressing, dry-salted and dried for days in airy rooms. It is sold fresh within days, kept under oil, or dried and stored in clay jars for up to a year.

Fully documentedCheese53 days – 4.7 monthsTraditional food product (PAT, Lazio)Family: Hard pressed ewe cheese family (Manchego and Pecorino Romano as templates)

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedFarm cheeses with no fixed amounts; the regional sheet records each farm's practice. Forms weigh 45–250 g.
Whole goat milk, or sheep, cow, goat-cow, sheep-goat, sheep-cow or buffalo-cow milkThe regional sheet records 14 local types by milk and method[lazio-sheet]
Lamb or kid rennet paste, or liquid rennet[lazio-sheet]
Salt (dry salting, or 18 °Bé brine on two farms)[lazio-sheet]
Wild thyme, chilli, and on the coast oregano, bay or rosemary (flavoured types)[lazio-sheet]
Olive or seed oil (types kept under oil)[lazio-sheet]
StarterThe regional sheet lists no starter for most places; in Cassino, mesophilic starter is added at 41 °C.

Total time across the recorded steps: 53 days – 4.7 months

Start
Drag the bar or press Play
up to 4 °C

What changes: Raw goat or mixed milk is filtered through cloth into the vat

Step 1 of 8
Collect and filter the milk
Time
Not documented
Temperature
up to 4 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Filtered through cloth. Most farms work raw milk; one Carpineto Romano type is pasteurised at 72 °C for 30 seconds. Cassino types 3 and 4 are heated in the vat at 85 °C for 30 minutes, and type 10 at 65 °C for 20 minutes.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

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

At a glance

A small cheese of the southern Lazio mountains, mostly of goat milk but also of sheep, cow or mixed milk. The curd is set with lamb or kid rennet, broken to rice-grain size, put into small moulds, in most types without pressing, dry-salted and dried for days in airy rooms. It is sold fresh within days, kept under oil, or dried and stored in clay jars for up to a year. Made in 8 steps over 53 days – 4.7 months. The longest step, store in clay jars or under oil, takes 30 days – 3.9 months (Regione Lazio).

Key numbers
Main step30 days – 3.9 monthsReported[lazio-sheet]Store in clay jars or under oil
Temperatureup to 4 °CReported[lazio-sheet]Collect and filter the milk

What makes this one different

Not one recipe but a family of farm cheeses from the southern Lazio mountains. Its moulds are pressed in only one of the 14 types (the Cassino type 10), and the airy mountain rooms, cane mats and clay jars do the drying and keeping.

Rind
Absent or a thin skin, white or ivory
Size
70–250 g in the ONAF sheet (45–250 g in the regional sheet); near-cylinder, 6–8 cm across, side at least 4 cm
Types
The regional sheet records 14 local types by milk and method

Related ferments

Variants

  • The regional sheet lists 14 local types by milk (goat, goat-cow, sheep-goat, sheep, cow, buffalo-cow) and method

Safety

Most farms use raw milk; a few pasteurise or heat it. CDC says products made from raw milk can carry Listeria, Salmonella, E. coli and other germs, with higher risk of serious illness for pregnant women, adults over 65, children under 5 and people with weak immune systems. Cheeses kept under oil are sold in jars.

History and sources

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

The ONAF sheet says Marzolino has been made for centuries, and that the name, "little March", comes from making it at the start of the milking season. By tradition it dried a few days on wooden racks and then kept for months in glass jars, dry or under olive oil. The sheet adds that in 1533 the cheese was supplied to the French court for Catherine de' Medici, and that the 1991 Atlas of Typical Italian Products lists it as a goat cheese of Latina and Frosinone.

Microbes
No study we found names its microbes.
  1. [lazio-sheet] Regione Lazio, analytical sheet of the traditional product 'Marzolino e/o Marzolina' (process steps by farm and municipality), copy hosted by ONAFgov
  2. [onaf-sheet] ONAF (national organisation of cheese tasters), technical sheet 'Marzolino o Marzolina'web
  3. [onaf] ONAF, cheese page 'Marzolino o Marzolina' (id 850)web
  4. [cdc-raw-milk] CDC, Raw Milk, Food Safety (page of 31 January 2025; raw milk and products made from it can carry Campylobacter, Cryptosporidium, E. coli, Listeria, Brucella and Salmonella)gov