Burratta

May 16, 2011

As I write this the sun is coming out after nearly 2 days of rain. We are sitting on the balcony of the apartment looking over the Adriatic Sea. Today is not so bad, a little rainy and windy.

Yesterday we traveled to Monte Sant’ Angelo, (another post) it was like being in a Midwest thunderstorm all day. I have never seen so many inside out umbrellas in my entire life.

As we planned this trip to Italy I made a list of foods and wines indigenous to Puglia and a goal to have each one touch my palate.

On the list is/was Burrata. Not the quasi barrata we see in San Diego. Real fresh Pugliese Burrata. This is one of the many special products that is almost impossible to duplicate in the United States due to milk processing regulations and the environment the animals that make the milk live.

You see there is terroir with milk as there is with wine. What goes in comes out. It sort of looks like fresh mozzarella but is much softer to the touch. When you cut the cheese the interior spills out, revealing soft, curd and fresh cream. If you're a lover of mozzarella or ricotta this cheese is what you want.

Burrata is not mozzarella. Burrata is its own thing entirely, and you'll know this the second you taste it.
The method used to make burrata is the same as mozzarella differing only in the stretching technique used and the fact that burrata has a filling, thick, spreadable strings of cream, with a slightly sour finish.

Buffalo milk gives the cheese a particular tanginess. Rennet (an enzyme) is added to warm milk to make the milk coagulate and separate into curds and whey. The curds solidify into blocks and they are then shredded into small pieces and immersed in very hot water. The heavy curds fall to the bottom and form a mass that is lifted out, turned, and kneaded using a wooden paddle. At this point, the process becomes an art form, as the cheese maker must know instinctively when to stop the pulling or stretching. For burrata, the still hot cheese is stretched into 3-inch rectangles that are then filled with leftover strands of mozzarella (straciatella) that have been left to soak in fresh cream from the whey. After it is filled with the straciatella and some of the clinging cream, the burrata is closed with a topknot. Finally, the burrata is brined briefly to flavor it.

For breakfast: burrata, bread, espresso and blood orange juice. For lunch: burrata thickly spread on fresh local bread, 2006 Taurasi Fratelli Urciulo DOCG, salami Napoletano, olives. Dinner antipasti: burrata, olives, fresh grilled local salsicce (sausage).

One of the exquisite foods of rustic relatively unknown “heel of the boot”  Puglia.