Montasio

Montasio is a semi-cooked cow's milk cheese from northeastern Italy, made in cylindrical wheels of 6 to 8 kilos, 30 to 35 centimetres across, with a smooth elastic rind. The DOP zone covers all of Friuli Venezia Giulia, the Veneto provinces of Belluno and Treviso and parts of Padua and Venice.

Minimum ageing is 60 days, and the age scale is the only thing you really need to understand about it. Up to five months it is fresco: white, supple, mild, small regular eyes, and it melts. From five to ten months it is mezzano or semistagionato: yellower, nuttier, the everyday cheese of a Friulian kitchen. Past ten months it is stagionato, firm and crumbly. Past eighteen it is stravecchio, hard and granular with tyrosine crystals and a proper piquant edge.

There is also an extra mention, Prodotto della Montagna, reserved for wheels whose milk is produced, worked and aged entirely in mountain territory: in practice, the malga cheeses of Carnia and the Julian Alps.

Unlike Asiago, which splits into two different cheeses at the vat, Montasio is one cheese that becomes several things as it ages.

Fresco tastes of sweet milk and butter with a clean, almost yoghurt-like finish, and has the elastic, squeaky texture of a good young alpine cheese. It is gentle to the point of being unremarkable on its own, which is exactly why it is a cooking cheese.

Mezzano, at six to eight months, is where most people fall for it: hazelnut, browned butter, cooked cream, a savoury depth that arrives late, and enough acidity to stay lively. This is the wedge to buy if you are buying only one.

Stagionato and stravecchio go dry and granular, with dried fruit, broth and roasted nut notes, a mineral saltiness and crunchy crystals. At two years it sits somewhere between an aged Asiago and a young Comté, though it stays rounder and less brothy than either.

Frico first, because it is what Montasio exists for. The crisp version is nothing but cheese: grate it, spread it in a dry non-stick pan over low heat, let it melt, bubble and set, then flip it once and lift out a lace wafer. The soft version adds boiled potato and slowly stewed onion, and comes out as a dense golden cake eaten with polenta.

The part Friulians never say out loud, because everyone there knows it: you need two ages. Roughly two thirds fresco, which melts and binds, and one third stagionato, which supplies the flavour. A single mid-age wedge makes frico that is either bland or greasy.

Beyond frico, fresco melts over polenta, into frittate and gratins, and into toc' in braide, the Friulian polenta served with a cheese cream. Mezzano is the sandwich and cheeseboard cheese. Stagionato and stravecchio grate over pasta, barley soup and cjarsons.

Like every semi-cooked alpine cheese it dislikes direct heat: melt it slowly, or off the flame with residual heat, or it will release fat and turn rubbery.

It belongs in the vegetable drawer of the fridge, wrapped first in a barely damp cloth and then in greaseproof paper. Fresco holds about three weeks, mezzano a couple of months, and stagionato and stravecchio up to four, and the same process runs through all of them: water leaves, the paste hardens, the salt concentrates and the rind darkens. Cling film against the surface makes the paste sweat and softens the rind, so either avoid it or change it every couple of days.

Where the cut face dries and goes glassy, scraping back a millimetre exposes the paste underneath. A dry white or green bloom on the rind wipes away with a cloth dipped in vinegar or white wine; anything damp, pink or black is a question for the cheesemonger or the dairy rather than something to settle at home. Aged pieces freeze in 200 gram blocks for six months when they are headed for a grater or a frico, while fresco thaws grainy and stops stringing. Half an hour out of the fridge before it reaches the table.

On the heel of the wheel the Consorzio mark repeats the word Montasio, pressed in by the marking hoop before salting, so it sits inside the rind rather than printed on the outside. Wheels that pass a hundred days also carry a fire-branded conformity mark. The rind is smooth, elastic and pale on a young cheese and turns hard, dry and brown with age, while the paste runs from white to straw and shows small, regular eyes spread evenly through it.

Two questions are worth asking at a counter. First the age, because fresco and stravecchio are effectively different cheeses and are often sold under the same name at similar prices. Second, whether the label says Prodotto della Montagna, which marks the mountain dairy version. Anything sold as Montasio-style, or simply as latteria, is not the DOP, although latteria is an honest Friulian category in its own right. Abroad it usually sits beside Asiago, which looks similar and is a separate DOP from further west.

In the US, Montasio is stocked by Italian delis, Eataly, Murray's Cheese, Wegmans and many well-stocked supermarket counters, at roughly $12 to $24 per pound depending on age. Ask which age you are buying, because American counters frequently sell everything from 3-month to 18-month wheels as simply 'Montasio'.

In the UK it is harder to find than Asiago or Fontina: Italian delicatessens, La Fromagerie and online importers carry it at about £18 to £30 per kilo. Ordering a fresco and a stagionato together is worth the postage if you plan to make frico properly.

On a whole wheel, the Consorzio mark with the word Montasio repeated around the side is impressed into the rind by the moulding band before salting, not printed on afterwards. Wheels past a hundred days also carry a fire-branded conformity mark. If you want the mountain cheese, look for the words Prodotto della Montagna on the label.

Carnia, the mountainous northwest of Friuli, is where the malga cheeses come from: Sutrio, Ovaro, Paluzza, Ravascletto, Forni Avoltri. In summer several high pastures sell directly, and mountain refuges serve frico with polenta stirred to order.

The Altopiano del Montasio itself, above Sella Nevea in the municipality of Chiusaforte, is the plateau that gave the cheese its name. It is reachable by road or on foot, and the malga makes and sells cheese through the grazing season.

Carpacco di Dignano, in the province of Udine, holds an annual Sagra del Frico, the fastest way to learn how many versions of the dish exist. Nearby, San Daniele del Friuli and Cividale offer the most Friulian pairing there is: young Montasio and raw ham, in osterie that have been serving it that way for a very long time.