Queijo da Serra da Estrela is Portugal's most celebrated cheese, a raw sheep's-milk Protected Designation of Origin from the Serra da Estrela mountains, made mainly in the cold months. Curdled with cardoon thistle, it ripens soft enough to spoon from its rind.
Ripe and gloriously gooey at the core, it spreads like warm butter with a rich, tangy, faintly gamey sheep's-milk flavor. The aroma is pungent and herbaceous, and a spoonful on warm bread is pure indulgence.
Plant-based cardoon rennet curdles the milk while its enzymes break down proteins during aging, producing the cheese's signature soft, spoonable paste and intense aroma.
Variations
Aged longer into the firmer Serra Velho, served with quince paste, paired with port, eaten by cutting off the top crust
On the Palate
Where Queijo da Serra da Estrela sits in the Portuguese flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 10How it's made
8 steps · 40 min
- 110 min
Gently warm fresh raw sheep's milk to a mild temperature.
Watch outWarm the milk to just body-temperature — hot enough for the cardoon rennet to set it, but never scalding, which would toughen the curd.
- 220 min
Steep dried cardoon thistle flowers in water and add the strained infusion as rennet.
- 345 min
Add salt and let the milk coagulate undisturbed until a soft curd forms.
Watch outLeave it dead still while it sets — jostling the pot before a clean soft curd forms breaks it and you lose the spoonable paste.
- 415 min
Cut and gently stir the curd, then drain off the whey.
- 512 min
Pack the curd firmly into cloth-lined molds to shape the wheels.
- 610 min
Press the cheeses lightly and turn them to expel more whey.
- 78 min
Salt the surface and move the wheels to a cool, humid curing room.
- 843200 min
Age for at least 30 days, washing and turning regularly until the paste turns creamy.
Watch outWash and turn through the aging — you're chasing the paste going creamy and spoonable at the core, not dry and crumbly.
