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Cheese from Italy, Lazio

Stagionato di bufala di Formellopecorino di bufala (customers' name)

Whole buffalo milk, usually pasteurised at 72 °C, is set at 38 °C with liquid bovine rennet and a farm-made sour-milk starter. The curd is broken four times with 10-minute rests, moulded in baskets, drained 4–5 days in a cold room and dry-salted. It ripens 6 months to a year, brushed or waxed, into a semi-hard table and grating cheese.

Fully documentedCheese6.2 months – 12 monthsPAT (traditional agri-food product, Lazio)Family: Uncooked or semi-cooked pressed cheese family (tomme, Saint-Nectaire, Reblochon, Morbier, Raclette)

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedThe sheet gives no doses. Each basket holds about 2.5 kg of curd, and a cheese weighs about 2 kg.
Whole buffalo milk from Lazio buffalo farms[arsial-sheet]
Liquid bovine rennet[arsial-sheet][onaf]
Lattoinnesto, the dairy's own starter of buffalo milk left to sour for 4–5 days[arsial-sheet]
Fine salt[arsial-sheet]
Food wax for the rind (optional)[arsial-sheet][onaf]
Starterlattoinnesto, buffalo milk soured for 4–5 days at the dairy

Total time across the recorded steps: 6.2 months – 12 months

Start
Drag the bar or press Play
2–4 °C

What changes: Starting material: buffalo milk held cold in steel silos

Step 1 of 7
Chill the milk
Time
up to 2 days
Reported
Temperature
2–4 °C
Reported
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
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

Whole buffalo milk, usually pasteurised at 72 °C, is set at 38 °C with liquid bovine rennet and a farm-made sour-milk starter. The curd is broken four times with 10-minute rests, moulded in baskets, drained 4–5 days in a cold room and dry-salted. It ripens 6 months to a year, brushed or waxed, into a semi-hard table and grating cheese. Made in 7 steps over 6.2 months – 12 months. The longest step, ripen, takes 6–12 months (ARSIAL 'Agricoltura Qualità') and runs at 4 °C (ARSIAL 'Agricoltura Qualità').

Key numbers
Main step6–12 monthsReported[arsial-sheet][onaf]Ripen
Temperature4 °CReported[arsial-sheet]Ripen
AciditypH 5.2–5.5Reported[arsial-sheet]Ripen

What makes this one different

A pressed, long-aged buffalo cheese made like a caciotta or pecorino, not a pasta filata; the curd is broken in four stages with 10-minute rests and ripens 6–12 months.

Size
Cylinder with basket marks, about 2 kg
Rind
Thin, semi-hard to hard; ochre if clean, blackish if waxed
Listing
Listed as 'Stagionato di bufala di Formello' among the cheeses of the Lazio section of the national traditional-products list (2025 edition)

Related ferments

Safety

The milk is usually pasteurised at 72 °C for 10–15 seconds, and the cheese is held at 4 °C until its pH falls to 5.2–5.5 before the long ripening.

History and sources

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

The sheet tells of 'nonno Peppe' Esposito, a cheesemaker of Campanian origin who moved to Formello in the 1950s to sell his family's buffalo cheeses in Rome. Regular customers call it 'pecorino di bufala'.

  1. [arsial-sheet] ARSIAL 'Agricoltura Qualità', Scheda di rilevamento dei prodotti tradizionali della Regione Lazio (D.M. 350/99), 'Stagionato di bufala di Formello' (copy hosted by ONAF)gov
  2. [onaf] ONAF, cheese page 'Stagionato di bufala di Formello' (id 1314)web
  3. [pat-lazio-list] ARSIAL (Regione Lazio), 'PAT Lazio 2025', the Lazio section of the national list of traditional agri-food products (Annex I, law 238 of 12 December 2016)gov