To Sir with Love…

To Sir with Love…

Hello Fellow Travelers!

Photo credit: Paška sirana

This week’s title is a slight play on words….No, it’s not a movie review of the classic 1967 British film starring Sidney Poitier and singer Lulu, but it’s about another European classic (cheese) that you may not have heard of…Paški Sir

If you know me well, you will know how passionate I am about cheese, and especially the protected cheeses of Europe and Switzerland…That’s why I wanted to dedicate today’s post to the newest protected cheese you may have never heard of, but hopefully with this new P.D.O. protection in place, cheese shops around the globe will bring this beautiful cheese in and show it some well-deserved love.

Image Courtesy of wikipedia

Just East of Italy, across the Adriatic Sea lies the Republic of Croatia. It is bordered by Slovenia to the North West, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the South, and Serbia to the South East. With a population around 4 million (about the same as Los Angeles) it sits at the gateway to Central and South East Europe.  

Due to its central location, it has been involved in many conflicts since the 1500’s, but today, its beautiful coastline has helped it to become one of the top 20 tourist destinations across Europe and even boasts 10 UNESCO World Heritage sites. The cuisine of this region is heavily influenced by Italian, Mediterranean, Austrian, Hungarian, and Turkish. Their climate is perfect for premium wines…and we all know, where there is great wines, there is bound to be great cheeses.

Paška Ovca Sheep – Image courtesy of Jasminko Herceg

Our feature cheese, Paški Sir, is produced just off the coast of Croatia on the small island of Pag, Croatia. With only 9,000 inhabitants, much of the island is home to sheep, wind farms, and salt. For more than 1,000 years, this region has been home to salt production due to their shallow bays.

Paški Sir is produced from Sheep’s Milk, specifically from the Paška Ovca Sheep, which have been bred to withstand the rocky climate of Pag. These sheep enjoy some of the 331 species of native plants that can be found on the island.

Let’s dig into the specifics of this cheese and learn some of the P.D.O. rules that surround it: 

Description - ‘Paški sir’ is a hard sheep’s cheese produced from whole sheep’s milk from the island of Pag’s native Paška Ovca Sheep. The product is matured for at least 60 days. In production since 1870.

Feed - The sheep spend the whole year on pastures where they graze or feed on coarse fodder (herbage and hay)produced in the ‘Paški sir’ production area.

Materials - Made from raw or heat-treated whole sheep’s milk from the island of Pag’s native breed of sheep,Paška Ovca. Animal rennet (or other coagulating enzymes of microbiological origin) and sea salt produced in the production area. Milk must be processed into cheese within 48 hours of milking.

Production – There is no specific steps mentioned in the production other than it must be produced within the ‘Paški sir’ production zone, and it the size, shape and fat/dry matter outlined below:

·      Shape: cylindrical, with a flat base and a flat or slightly convex upper surface;

·      Size: diameter of 18 cm to 24 cm, height of 7 cm to 13 cm;

·      Weight: from 1,8 kg to 3,5 kg depending on the size of the cheese;

·      Dry matter: at least 55 %;

·      Fat in dry matter: at least 45 %;

·      Rind: smooth and hard, with a golden yellow to pale reddish-brown color;

·      Paste: compact, weakly elastic, easy to cut, dense texture, with no or very few small irregular holes, pale yellow in color; it loses elasticity as it matures and the color becomes darker in tone;

·      Taste: slightly sharp and sweet, becoming sharper as it matures; 

·      Aroma: typical of sheep’s cheeses with hints of aromatic herbs. 

·      Age: Matured for at least 60 days, but many producers age the product longer

 Michele Buster, co-owner of importer, Forever Cheese, first encountered the cheese on a trip to Croatia in 2005. This was about the same time that Ante Pernar, founded a Paški Sir cheesemakers association whose aim was to protect the cheese both nationally and beyond. Today, his daughter Martina Pernar (Marketing Director for Paška Sirana) explains: “This is a historical moment for all Paški Sir cheese producers because for us, this is not just a cheese. Paški Sir, for us, is more than food, more than cheese. We feel it is a part of our tradition, part of our identity, something that we are very proud of.” 

So how does it taste?...In a word, awesome! Paški Sir won a Gold Medal at the Global Cheese Awards in 2017 in Great Britain. 

Paški Sir was registered as a Protected Designation of Origin (P.D.O.) cheese on November 25, 2019 by the European Union.

Always remember: Sir je život ... Uživajte u najvećoj! (Cheese is life...Enjoy it to the fullest!)

Trevor