Queso Camerano

Appearance & taste

Queso Camerano has the shape of a cylindrical cake with a smooth top and bottom and an outward-curving side. It is small and weighs 200 to 1,200 g. The outside shows the woven pattern of the “cilla”, the mould in which it drains. The paste is compact and firm, practically without holes or cracks, uniformly white or slightly ivory, elastic and keeps its shape. The cheese contains at least 35 % fat in dry matter.

It comes in four stages: as fresh cheese, ready to eat immediately after production, as soft cheese after at least 15 days, as semi-ripened cheese after at least 30 and as ripened cheese after at least 75 days. Fresh and soft cheese are soft to semi-hard and have no rind; semi-ripened and ripened cheeses are semi-hard to firm and have a distinct rind with brown to brownish-green mould.

As it ripens, taste and smell become more intense: unripened mild and faintly acidic, briefly ripened slightly acidic and somewhat salty, long ripened moderately acidic, salty and slightly bitter. There are also notes of goat, rennet and wild herbs from the pastures. Fresh and soft cheese have a slight whey taste, ripened cheeses a mushroom-like one reminiscent of a cave. The cheese is only sold whole.

Production

The milk comes from the area, from goats of the Serrana, Murciana-Granadina, Malagueña and Alpina breeds and their crosses. When the weather allows, the animals graze outdoors every day all year round, mainly in scrub vegetation; only after giving birth do the mothers stay with their young. Their feed is supplemented with by-products from the area such as cereal straw, vine shoots, olive twigs, almond shells, vegetable stubble and beet pulp, as well as pulses, cereals, lucerne and vetch. In normal weather, pasture and by-products cover around 80 % of the feed.

Fresh, soft and semi-ripened cheese are made from pasteurised milk, ripened cheese from raw or pasteurised milk. The milk is curdled with natural goat rennet; the curd still contains a lot of moisture even after being cut several times. It is never pressed: in the “cilla” only its own weight acts on it, and the cheese drains slowly and for a long time. The cilla used to be woven from willow; today it is made of plastic, with the same shape. Because the mass does not bind particularly well in the process, according to the specification large wheels cannot be made.

During ripening, when the rind forms, the cheese is turned and cleaned. If it ripens for 30 days or longer, the rind may be coated with olive oil against mould. Milk production, cheesemaking, ripening and storage take place in registered businesses in the area.

Origin & history

The area covers 407,149 ha of the 503,388 ha region of La Rioja. Although it lies in the north of Spain, its climate is distinctly Mediterranean; the Sierra de Cantabria protects it from damp northerly winds. In the south lies the Sierra de Cameros, which gave the cheese its name: with rare, unevenly distributed rainfall, very cold winters, hot summers and late frosts. Its soils grow broom, heather, thyme, rosemary, brambles, thorny shrubs and juniper, which according to the specification shape the aroma of the cheese through the milk.

Families in the mountains often kept one or more goats; they made surplus milk into cheese to preserve it. The shepherds of the Sierra de Cameros made cheese on the spot in willow baskets. With the seasonal movement of the herds between valleys and uplands, the “Transterminancia”, the cheese spread to other parts of La Rioja. Gonzalo de Berceo already mentions cheese as an offering of the “camberos” in his “Vida de San Millán”. From the end of the 1960s, goat numbers and cheesemaking declined because of emigration and afforestation, but artisanal production survived for home consumption and to order.