Parmesan cheese (Parmigiano Reggiano cheese)

Parmesan, also known as Parmigiano Reggiano has a hard, gritty texture, light-yellow cheese with a very strong flavor and is fruity and nutty in taste. It blends extremely well with meat, tomato and vegetables sauce. Parmesan cheese is mostly grated over pastas, used in soups and risottos. It is also eaten on its own as a snack.

Parmesan typically contains 8 grams of fat and 400 milligrams of sodium per ounce. As with most cheese, reduced-fat and nonfat versions are available.

The basic fraction of Parmesan cheese contains mostly heterocyclic nitrogen-containing compounds, such as alkylpyrazines. These compounds have characteristic nutty, roasted, and cocoa-like aromas.

While nonfat Parmesan works beautifully in sauces, soups, dressing and casseroles and a topping for pasta, it is too dry to be used as a topping on focaccia bread, bread sticks and casseroles.

Parmesans are primarily used for grating and in Italy are termed grana, meaning "grain," referring to their granular textures. Sometimes parmesan is part of the sauce, sometimes simply used as a garnish.

In order to get the best-tasting of parmesan, it always suggested that to buy Parmigiano-Reggiano, which tastes noticeably better than domestic Parmesan cheese. Parmesan is the English and American translation of the Italian word Parmigiano-Reggiano. There is also evidence that in the 17th to 19th centuries Parmigiano-Reggiano was called Parmesan in Italy and France.

The manufacturing process dates back to the Middle Ages, when monks developed a dry-paste cheese assembled into large wheels of up to 39 pounds (18 kg) each. These were suited for long-term preservation.

Real Italian Parmesan is manufactured under strict regulations. The cheese is made from the milk of a certain type of cow that can only live on farms in a specific area surrounding the northern Italian city of Parma.
Parmesan cheese (Parmigiano Reggiano cheese)