🧀 Queso Camerano

Queso Camerano is a Spanish goat's milk cheese with a protected designation of origin (PDO) from La Rioja. It is a small, compact and firm cheese, white or slightly marbled when cut, with a smooth paste and almost no holes. It belongs to the soft cheeses without mould and to the Spanish cheeses.

All the milk comes from healthy goats of the Serrana, Murciano-Granadina, Malagueña and Alpine breeds and their crosses, kept in the defined area. The goats feed mainly on natural vegetation such as shrubs and graze every day, with local farm by-products as a supplement. The milk is curdled with natural rennet of goat origin. The curd is cut but stays moist, and is drained only by its own weight in a «cilla» mould (traditionally plaited cane, now plastic) without mechanical pressing; the mould leaves a lattice pattern on the surface.

There are four types: fresh (fresco), eaten once production is complete; soft (tierno), aged at least 15 days; semi-cured (semicurado), at least 30 days; and cured (curado), at least 75 days. Fresh, soft and semi-cured cheeses are made from pasteurised milk, cured cheese from raw or pasteurised milk. Fresh and soft cheeses have no rind; semi-cured and cured ones have a defined rind with some brown or greenish-brown mould. The cheese is a cake-shaped cylinder weighing 200–1,200 g, with at least 35 % fat in the solids. The taste is sweet and slightly acidic when unaged and becomes saltier and slightly bitter with long ageing.

Queso Camerano or any goat’s cheese? Camerano is a Spanish PDO goat’s cheese from La Rioja, and it is not a soft log of fresh chèvre. The curd is drained only by its own weight in a cilla mould, without pressing, so the paste stays smooth with almost no holes. Four types exist, from fresh to cured; the fresh version is eaten as soon as it is made, the cured one ripens longer and tastes saltier.

Look for the name “Queso Camerano” and the words D.O.P. QUESO CAMERANO on the label approved by the Regulatory Board; D.O.P. is the Spanish form of the EU PDO (protected designation of origin). The cheese is sold whole as a small cylinder with a lattice pattern. Delicatessens and cheese counters carry the semi-cured and cured types.

The production area covers municipalities of the districts of Rioja Alta and the Sierra Rioja Alta, Media and Baja, plus listed municipalities of Rioja Media and Rioja Baja. According to the specification, goatherds of the Cameros mountains first made it in cane «cillas». The cheese is sold as a whole piece under the label approved by the Regulatory Board with the words D.O.P. QUESO CAMERANO.