Caciocavallo is a type of stretched-curd cheese made out of sheep's or cow's milk. It is produced throughout Southern Italy, especially mostly on the Apennine Mountains. Shaped like a tear-drop, it is similar in taste to the aged Southern Italian Provolone cheese, with a hard edible rind.
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The Italian name of the cheese caciocavallo means "Cheese on horseback" and it is thought that derive the name from the fact that two cheese forms are always bound together with rope and then left to mature by placing them 'a cavallo', i.e. straddling, upon a horizontal stick or branch.[1]
Apparently caciocavallo was mentioned the first time around 500BC by Hippocrates, emphasising the "Greeks' cleverness in making cheese".[2] Types of cheese with names similar to "caciocavallo" are common throughout the Balkans and Southern Italy. In Sicily, the Ragusano DOP, known locally as "caciocavallo ragusano" had to drop the denomination "caciocavallo" in order to get DOP status.[3]
Many different types of caciocavallo exist in Italy and several are recognized as Prodotto agroalimentare tradizionale (traditional regional food product) like Caciocavallo podolico (produced using only milk from the Podolica cattle breed) or Caciocavallo di Godrano (often called caciocavallo Palermitano).
Caciocavallo Silano is made with cow’s milk in designated areas of Southern Italy, in the regions of Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise and Puglia and has gained Protected Geographical Status status in 1993.[4]
Albanian: Kaçkavall; Bulgarian and Macedonian Кашкавал; Romanian: Caşcaval; Serbian: Качкаваљ/Kačkavalj; Sicilian: Caciucavaddu; Turkish: Kaşkaval; Greek: Κασέρι; Arabic: Kashkawane (Arabic: قشقوان).
Each of these local speciality cheeses is different from both Caciocavallo Silano and each other.
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