Abstract :
Most Portuguese cheeses possessing a Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) status are
still manufactured following traditional methods – the majority of which use raw milk
from small ruminants (mainly sheep), coagulated with a rennet from plant origin (wild
thistle flowers) and without deliberate addition of any starter/nonstarter culture; the most
famous and representative of these cheeses is Serra da Estrela. Most steps required for
its manufacture are performed manually (or otherwise empirically), and are controlled by
the cheesemaker herself based on own intuition and past experience – thus leading to a
wide variability among dairy farms, and even from day to day cheese batches. This paper
reviews and updates fundamental and applied knowledge encompassing technological,
microbiological, chemical, organoleptic and textural features of traditional PDO cheeses,
manufactured in Portugal from ovine and caprine (or both) milks.
