HISTORY

 

As far back as the year 1000, a delicious cheese was made using sheep’s milk on the delightful plateau of the Sette Comuni di Asiago, hence its name, Asiago. Around the year 1500, sheep were gradually replaced by cows because cows, unlike sheep, did not pull up the grass by its roots when they grazed but gently cropped it, averting landslides and the slipping of the thin layer of humus which covered the rocks just below the surface, preventing hydrogeological instability and desertification of the plateau.

Cow’s milk eventually replaced sheep’s milk and the cheese-making technique, which is still practised today in the shepherd’s huts on the plateau and was also adopted in the dairies in the production area, was established.

The most traditional Asiago, which closely resembles the simple cheese made by the cheese makers on the plateau, is definitely the Mature variety, also known as “d’Allevo” and is made from semi-skimmed milk. 

In the 1920s local dairies began producing Fresh Asiago, also called “Asiago Pressato”, because as soon as the cheese wheels are produced, they are compacted using presses in order to dry them out as much as possible. Fresh Asiago is made using whole milk and has a shorter ageing period than the Mature variety. 

Nowadays anyone wanting to turn back the clock and taste the "pegorin" mentioned by the shepherds, does not have to go far: Asiago DOP Stravecchio is a worthy rival to the most famous mature cheeses on the international gourmet scene.