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All Spain Casar de Cáceres Museo del Queso
Gastro Obscura

Museo del Queso

A cheese discovery made by shepherds became the pride of a region.

Casar de Cáceres, Spain

Added By
Luke Fater
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It takes 20 sheep to make 2.2 pounds of Torta del Casar.   Turismo Casar de Caceres/used with permission
It takes 20 sheep to make 2.2 pounds of Torta del Casar.   Turismo Casar de Caceres/used with permission
“Cuajo” give the cheese its trademark flavor.   Turismo Casar de Caceres/used with permission
The museum is housed in a typical “casareña.”   Turismo Casar de Caceres/used with permission
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About

No country seems to like food museums as much as Spain. Wine, cheese, honey, chocolate: you name it, there's a museum for it. Many exhibitions explore the origins and variations of the long-eaten foods that make the country a culinary destination. One museum in Extremadura, however, is dedicated to one cheese, and one cheese only.

The Museo del Queso in the village of Casar de Cáceres celebrates the centuries-old regional specialty Torta del Casar. Long-ago shepherds, nudging herds of sheep down roads used since Roman times, realized that the cardo, a purple-flowered thistle lining the paths, could coagulate their sheep’s milk into cheese. The thistle, known as cardoon in English, is a relative of the artichoke and gives the slowly-aged cheese its subtle bitter flavor. With an unusually soft, semiliquid center, the pressed cylinder of cheese sags in the middle. 

The simple museum, housed in a typical local abode, showcases the production of the cheese as well as the lifestyles of the mere eight families who today produce Torta del Casar. So sacred is the cheese-making process that in 1999, the Extremadura government created the Denominación de Origen del Casar, a regulatory body charged solely with certifying regional Torta and policing imitation cheeses. This body also ensures that the cheese is only made from the milk of Merino and Entrefina sheep⁠—notoriously ungenerous milk-producers. It takes 20 of these sheep to yield 2.2 pounds of cheese. It’s perhaps no surprise that the museum withholds free samples.

Related Tags

Cheese Spain Museums Sheep Discovery Villages Flowers

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Check the website for seasonal schedules. Closed Mondays.

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Added By

lukefater

Published

August 23, 2019

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Sources
  • https://www.sfgate.com/food/cheesecourse/article/It-takes-a-herd-of-sheep-to-make-one-small-wheel-2556118.php
  • https://web.archive.org/web/20051124122004/http://www.tortadelcasar.org/ingles.html
Museo del Queso
Calle Barrionuevo Bajo, 7
Casar de Cáceres
Spain
39.56205, -6.416345
Visit Website
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Photo of Spain

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Stories 38

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Spain

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