Fontina PDO

POD stamp for the Aosta Valley queen of cheeses

Fontina is a cheese that brings together all the exclusive aspects of unpasteurized and whole milk and its manufacture; it has a compact, thin, brown crust, inside of which is a semi-cooked, elastic and soft paste with a few small holes. The cheese is a pale yellow colour if produced in winter, when the cows are fed hay, and becomes a deeper yellow if produced during the summer. It has a sweet taste and its fragrant aroma intensifies as it matures.

This cheese has a high energy value, being rich in phosphorus, calcium and vitamins A and B: it is a whole, genuine and digestible food.

Its production is controlled by a rigid discipline which defines it: "a fatty cheese with a semi-cooked paste, produced with whole milk from the Val d’Aosta breed of cows (red-brindle, black-brindle, chestnut), obtained in one milking".

In 1996, Fontina gained the Protected Designation of Origin (DOP) stamp from the European Union, which unequivocally decrees that it must be produced exclusively in the Aosta Valley region, a region with particular geographical, pedological, climatic, agronomic and cultural conditions, thus protecting it from attempts at imitation.

When it is fully matured, the Fontina DOP Consortium of Producers and Protection proceeds with stamping: the authenticity and quality of wheels bearing this stamp are guaranteed.

The Fontina POD wheel has an average weight of around 9 kg and is aged for a minimum of 80 days.

It can be sold whole, cut or packaged: in the latter case, the operation must be carried out only in the production area and is controlled and certified.
On the market you can also find the long-matured version and the one produced in mountain pastures.

The "Fontina DOP long seasoning" is aged in caves for a minimum of 180 days during which the flavors are enhanced giving the Fontina a more intense and aromatic flavour. The wheels have a brown rind tending towards dark, an intense yellow paste, soft and melting, on the palate it has more intense and persistent aromatic vegetal and lactic notes.
"Fontina DOP Alpeggio" is produced from June to September in the mountain pastures of the Aosta Valley up to 2,700 meters above sea level, where Aosta Valley cows graze freely, feeding on fresh herbs and mountain flowers. The freshly milked milk is transformed directly on site, in the mountain pasture dairies, to maintain its unique organoleptic characteristics deriving from the high mountain flora unaltered. The wheels have a light brown rind, the paste has an intense straw yellow colour, due precisely to the feeding of the cows, and is soft and melting. On the palate it is particularly sweet and aromatic thanks to the hints of fresh grass and mountain flowers which are added to the lactic hints typical of Fontina DOP.