The saffron cheese of Enna, in the hills of central Sicily: a whole sheep's-milk cheese whose paste is dyed golden and scented with saffron and dotted through with whole black peppercorns. The curd is pressed into a small cylinder in a woven basket, brine-salted and aged for a few months, coming out firm, deep yellow and warmly spiced. It is a Slow Food Presidio and has been a DOP since 2011.
The name has nothing to do with the city of Piacenza; it comes from the Sicilian 'piacentinu', from 'piacenti', pleasing, a cheese made to please. Local legend ties the saffron to the Norman age, telling that Count Roger, Roger I of Sicily, had a golden cheese made to lift the melancholy of his wife Adelasia in the eleventh century, though saffron and spiced cheeses are said to be noted in Sicily as far back as Roman-era writers, so the flavour is older than the tale. The saffron must be grown around Enna itself, and the cheese was taken up as a Slow Food Presidio to protect the tradition, winning its DOP in 2011, with production centred on Enna and neighbouring towns.
Cut open, the paste is an even deep yellow flecked with black, and the aroma is saffron, earthy, honeyed, faintly bitter, over the rich, slightly gamy warmth of sheep's milk. The body is firm but supple, and biting into a peppercorn releases a small burst of sharp heat. The finish is long, savoury and gently spiced.
Saffron does more than colour the cheese. Its pigment crocin is water-soluble, so steeped into the warm milk it dyes the paste an even gold, while safranal and picrocrocin carry the spice's earthy, bittersweet aroma into the curd. Sheep's milk is far richer in fat and casein than cow's, which is why it sets a dense, high-yield paste and a full, faintly gamy flavour. Lactic fermentation and lamb rennet coagulate the milk; pressing in the basket drives out whey and knits the curd; brine draws out more moisture and seasons it. Over the months of aging, rennet and microbial enzymes break casein into savoury peptides and amino acids while lipases free fatty acids, and the whole peppercorns hold their piperine to give sharp pockets of heat throughout.
Variations
Some makers press the saffron cheese without the pepper, or vary how much they use; a plainer white sheep's cheese from the same dairies goes without saffron altogether. Piacentinu is eaten young as a table cheese and aged longer for grating, and the DOP now fixes it to Enna-grown saffron and local sheep's milk, setting it apart from the many golden imitations sold around Sicily.
On the Palate
Where Piacentinu Ennese DOP sits in the Italian flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 10How it's made
7 steps · 30 min
- 130 min
Warm the whole sheep's milk and steep the Enna saffron threads in it until the milk turns gold.
Watch outSteep the saffron in the warm milk until it turns an even gold — that uniform color is the crocin dyeing the whole paste through.
- 240 min
Set the milk with lamb rennet and let it coagulate.
- 330 min
Break the curd, scald and work it, folding in the whole black peppercorns.
- 430 min
Pack the curd into a woven basket mould, pressing firmly to drive out the whey.
Watch outPress the curd firmly in the basket to drive out the whey — leave whey in and the paste stays wet and won't age dense.
- 5480 min
Salt the pressed forms in brine.
- 6129600 min
Age them in a cool cellar for a couple of months or more, turning the forms as they mature.
- 75 min
The paste sets deep gold and firm; cut from the form to serve.
