Friday, March 4, 2011

triple threat

Oggi, I discovered how Parmigiano Reggiano is made, how Proscuitto is aged, and how they get Balsamic Vinegar from grapes.

First up is the cheese factory. The first thing we entered was a dressing room where we needed to put plastic on our feet, a plastic apron on, a paper hat, and a mask on. Then we smelled it. The fermented milk. It was a mix of sour milk and delicious Parmigiano Reggiano cheese in the air (the name by the way comes from the two towns, Parma and Reggio which are the two places the cheese is traditionally made).

We saw where the fresh raw milk sets out overnight. Then they skim it, warm it, add yesterdays whey, add natural rennet which is a natural enzyme from the stomach of suckling calves. They break up the curds, heat it up, and there ya go. It was a pretty cool experience.










Then onto the bus we go to the Prosciutto factory. We went to a "modest" farmer who had 52,000 pigs legs in one room. They are worth 130 euros each. He also feeds 20,000 guests a year. Anyway... We learned that no longer than 5 days can pass before the process of making the leg into Prosciutto starts. The pigs are tattooed when they are born so we know where the legs come from and when. They are salted and aged and salted and aged and glazed with sugna, which is a mix of a liquid from the heart and lung then a little salt and pepper and rice wheat, and there you have it.

Oh yea, and we had lunch.


First came out bread and walnuts and wine. Then the pasta came around in the fresh prosciutto tomato sauce. In our brochures, it said pasta lunch, so we all filled up and relaxed when they took our trays away.

Then the prosciutto came out, a plate for each of us. Then the salad came out. Then the tray of all different kinds of desserts.

It was delicious.







We all rolled ourselves out to the bus, took a picture of the snow-covered rolling hills, and on we went to Modena (pronounced Moden-A not mo-den`-a).

The building was built in 1700, but the family has been there since the 1800s. They are the oldest and largest family that produces balsamic vinegar in Modena out of the 120 families. All balsamic vinegar is bottled in Modena, but only 120 families produce the traditional balsamic vinegar. The rest is all processed and made with chemicals. The Acetaia Malpighi family has three locations, but this building is the oldest. There were only 500 barrels in the attic of this building, but their other locations have 2,500 barrels which total 3,000 barrels.

Pure grape juice is cooked outside over a wood burning fire for 48 hours and put into a barrel. The barrels are kept upstairs because that is the hottest place in the summer and the coldest in the winter. In the summer 10% from each barrel evaporates. There are 5 different barrel sizes, which uses 5 different kinds of wood. Each barrel made of one kind of wood. Every winter they cook a new batch. Before they put it anywhere, they go to the smallest and add 10% from the next slightly bigger one. Then the 2nd smallest is filled by the middle one. Then the middle one is filled by the 2nd largest. Then the new one is filled with the new batch. Thus the ingredients are grape juice made from fresh pressed black and white grapes and age.

After 12 years, it can be bottled into a bottle with a yellow top. If it is aged 25 years or more, it gets a gold top.







The only place in the US that sells this stuff is William Sonoma. For traditional balsamic vinegar from Modena in the traditional small bottle is 50 euros at the production location or $120 at home. Crazy.



To put it simply, today was delicious.

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