Our supply chain
The most important feature which makes Parmigiano Reggiano Bio Hombre a special cheese is the nutrition of dairy cattle. These cows can be fed through natural biological ingredients only and the basis of the ration (more than 60%) consists of dried hay which is produced in our fields. This hay confers to the milk grass and sunny perfumes, together with that lovely minerality, typical of our cheese
How to do it?
Our cows are milked two times a day, the milk obtained during the night is directly sent to the dairy farm and put into outcrop tanks: big spaces where milk can rest all over the night. During this rest, milk fats reach the surface. In this way, we obtained a division between the cream (which is removed and used to produce butter) and skimmed milk.
The skimmed milk is blended with the milk obtained in the morning which is whole milk (without skimming), in this way we get a semi-skimmed milk. The milk mixture is put in caldere, copper tanks where they are transformed into Parmigiano Reggiano. In fact, here, rennet and whey starter are added to milk. Whey starter is a part of the whey which remains from the day-before processing and it is particularly rich of lactic ferments. In this way, we obtain the “cagliata”, a sort of pudding which is divided into little grains thanks to a tool called “spino”.
The cagliata grains are cooked at 55°C and left to rest under whey. During the rest period, grains reach the bottom of the
caldera forming a single mass which can be extracted, cut in two parts and each of them will become a cheese block. Each of these blocks will be put into “fascere” to remove the extra whey and in order to take the typical shape of Parmgiano Reggiano. Every caldera contains about 1000 litres of milk from which we get two blocks of Parmigiano Reggiano of 40 Kg.
After two days of rest in the fascera, the blocks are immersed in a solution of salty water for 21days in order to acquire the right flavor. Our block is ready to start its long rest period in our warehouse.
Maturing process
Contrary to other similar cheese, in order to produce Parmigiano Reggiano it is forbidden to use any preservative, even if it has a natural origin (f.e Lisozima).
Parmigiano Reggiano’s ingredients are milk, salt, rennet and time only. After 12 months of maturing process, the Battitori o del Consorzio del Parmigiano Reggiano come to the farm in orde to assess the quality of the cheese produced. These people use a specific gavel and much experience. By softly hitting the cheese block and listening the sound produced, they can establish if there are little cracks or holes, due to production mistake or maturing problems. The best blocks only can be approved and declared Parmigiano Reggiano with relative fire branding.
Cheese blocks which have small imperfections will be marked as Parmigiano Reggiano but the crust will be scratched along the whole external circumference, so that the customer can clearly see that the quality is not a first choice quality, that’s why it is called Parmigiano Reggiano “rigato”. Blocks which do not overcome the exam of Battitori could not receive the fire branding and will be downgraded as formaggio “senza nome” or formaggio “sbiancato”.