Name: Brânză de oi
Yield: 4
Cuisine: Moldovan
Ingredients: Brânză cu smântână (cheese with soured cream) as a starter:; 300 g brânză de oi or feta; 200 g soured cream (smântână); 1 small bunch of dill, finely chopped; 2 spring onions, finely sliced; freshly ground black pepper; bread or slices of mămăligă to serve

Brânză de oi is the white, salted sheep's cheese that comes to the table with almost every meal in Moldova: crumbled over mămăligă, in plăcinte and colțunași, or with soured cream as a starter. It is made by kneading fresh curds with salt and leaving them to mature in brine for months. The taste is salty, slightly sour and crumbly, related to feta and Romanian telemea.

Origins and history

The Romanian word brânză is probably older than Latin in the region, and it travelled north with shepherds: in Slovak and Polish it became bryndza. Sheep farming in Moldova goes back centuries, and according to an overview by Made in Moldova, sheep's cheese already appears in the scarce written sources in 1374. The same overview points to a difference with Romania. There, a wider range of regional cheeses exists, such as telemea, brânză de burduf and cașcaval, which are less well known in Moldova. The Moldovan tradition centres mainly on salted sheep's brânză, fresh and salted caș, and urdă.

How it is made

Raw sheep's milk is curdled, in the countryside traditionally with rennet from lambs' stomachs; strict vegetarians should bear that in mind. The drained curd is called caș and is eaten fresh or salted. To make brânză, the caș is kneaded with salt and left to mature in brine for a few months, until it is white, slightly sour and crumbly. The leftover whey is boiled to make urdă, a soft, sweetish cheese that resembles ricotta.

Where and how to try it

Farm brânză rarely makes it onto supermarket shelves: most of it is sold at farmers' markets or directly by shepherds and farmers. Piața Centrală in Chișinău is the best known of these markets. A rule of thumb among Moldovan shoppers: real sheep's cheese is always bright white, while a yellowish tinge points to added cow's milk, in which case the price should be lower. According to the same source, Moldova does not import any sheep's or goat's cheese; what you eat is local.