What is it?

The Piacentinu Ennese is an hard cheese, semi-cooked with a typical scent of sheep’s cheeses; an harmonious taste arrives on the palate, the result of the contrast between saffron and black pepper. The Piacentino, cylindrical shape, weighs between 3 and 6 kilos and has a golden yellow rind, thin in the first months of aging, which thickens up to a maximum of 5mm with the passing of time. Inside, which can be softer or semi-hard, it can be also golden yellow in colour due to the presence of saffron, and with small holes formed by whole grains of black pepper.

How it is made?

The milk is heated in a steel boiler, then placed into a specific wooden chest, tine, and combined with saffron and lamb rennet. Once thickened, it is broken in small granules with the use of a wooden stick (the patella) and with the addition of hot water, to facilitate the emission of the whey.

When it settles on the bottom, the “curd” is extracted by hand and placed on a steel surface. The mass is cut into coarse pieces, placed in rush baskets together with black pepper, and immediately hot whey is poured in the chest. After 3-4 hours the first drying phase starts. And after about 24 hours, the cheese is evenly sprinkled with fine salt. Then rest. After 10-15 days, the salting process is repeated.

Where is it from?

Think about a curious combination: black pepper and saffron that give a cheese its scent and flavour. And think about what which unusual place it comes from: the Sicilian hinterland. An island inside the island; rugged hills, far away from the sea, different in colour at every season: brown earth in autumn, when rains are expected to prepare for sowing; green slopes in spring, when the grains grow and soften a hard, almost grumpy, and desert landscape, especially in June, when the ears are ripe and all around is yellow. As far as the eye can see. From the Caltanissetta downhill to the entrance of the Catania gardens, which then go down till the sea under the Etna’s fiery gaze.

Yellow is also u Piacentinu nourished by these changes and bringing in the mouth the condensate of those colours.

Enna, the highest city in Italy, dominates this scene from above. From its castle. Enna observes the flourishing of this taste of modernity, on the tables of the chefs who value it, but that also smells of the past, in the memory of those who have crossed those valleys.

It seems that the first form of this cheese was prepared for Ruggero il Normanno I’s wife, Adelasia di Monferrato, who suffered from depression and appreciated only dairy products. One of the court experts introduced saffron as an antidepressant spice in rennet, meeting with the queen’s approval. Or rather, her “pleasing” approval. Hence the name.

It is just a legend. But it doesn’t matter. This product that arrives at your table is the legitimate child of a mostly unknown territory, which is full of historical records and contradictions.

Contradictions and history that in the Piacentinu have an unique taste.

Good discovery.