Blue Cheese 61: a dairy jewel, a love story

This week we tell you a love story. We will do so by narrating the tale of the Blu 61 cheese and how this legendary Italian blue cheese has replaced a ring or red roses to become a true jewel, a symbol of pure and timeless love.

We are near the Treviso plain south of the city. They are small towns in the heart of Veneto where traditions and peasant culture still endure today in the simplicity and genuineness of the generations. Strong, straightforward, pragmatic people, devoted to innovation with an innate creativity and an entrepreneurial spirit that few other Italian territories possess. Here lived two beautiful young people: Antonio and Giuseppina.

Blu 61 cheese, a love story

Antonio has never stopped adoring his muse, and their wedding in 1961 was said to be a grand celebration. For Antonio, it was the most desired day, as he could finally live his life with Giuseppina. These are timeless love stories that, now more than ever, carry the taste of purity and daily sacrifice. A perfect marriage that has given life three times and beautifully portrayed an adventurous and courageous existence, marked by the creative instinct of Antonio Carpenedo.

Yes, that same Antonio, the cheesemaker with a "passion" for maturation. His idea of cheese marrying different raw materials is a virtuous journey he constantly shared with Giuseppina. The years pass, and gradually arrives the big milestone, the fiftieth wedding anniversary: 1961-2011. Their fiftieth anniversary is a date that Antonio had to celebrate with an unforgettable gift. Would it be a ring that made the difference? Of course not, Antonio is not one for such sentimental gestures, but at the same time, he possesses a sensitivity and a heart that characterize his entire life. Otherwise, certain dairy masterpieces would not have been created.

Antonio decides to leave an indelible mark not just in the timeless relationship of love with his Giuseppina: he wants to commemorate it with a unique creation, probably unrepeatable, a magnum opus representing the synthesis of his journey hand in hand with Giuseppina. His life was divided between his beloved, their children, and cheese: and here comes the idea! A cheese that encapsulated within itself technical maturation performance and exponential pleasantness in pure form. It had to have the red color of love and passion. It needed to captivate with its beauty, just like Giuseppina had done fifty years earlier. It should make one close their eyes from pleasure, once brought to the lips, like a long and endless kiss. It had to sigh for enjoyment, like a caress through the hair, a warm embrace. It had to be creamy and seductive like bodies rubbing together, in love and conquered by passion. It had to be the Blu 61!

This was the right gift from Antonio to Giuseppina. And she greatly appreciated it! The Blu 61 became, thanks to this beautiful story, the true best seller in the history of the Carpenedo family's affinements. It can be said that from this extraordinary occasion, a new awareness of the potential and creative capabilities of the Camalò company was born.

But how is Blu 61 made?

First of all, we start with a form of blue cheese produced with cow's milk, to which particular cultures belonging to the Penicillium roqueforti family have been inoculated. The blue cheese, once aged for a period established by the Carpenedo family, is immersed in pomace and literally in sweet Raboso wine. A sweet wine made from native grapes from the Treviso and Venice plains, produced by the Giorgio Cecchetto winery, which receives great international recognition every year. So a great sweet red wine from dried grapes for an equally great cheese. After the immersion in the wine, the cheese undergoes a thickening of its rind, which turns purplish. At this point, dried red berries are placed on the surface of the cheese. A touch of magic that enhances the red coloring and embellishes it like a ruby jewel.

Today Blu 61 is the cheese of lovers

Blu 61 has become the true cheese of lovers, embodying the flavor and that timeless lightness of being that characterizes those who never tire of experiencing the exhilaration of novelty. Today this extraordinary cheese has become the “rockstar” of La Casearia Carpenedo, receiving the most important international accolades every year. In fact, this year it was awarded as the best blue cheese in Italy at Cheese in Bra. The Harrod's windows in London have reserved a special space for it among the luxury foods from around the world, with an exhibition that will go down in the history of Italian cheeses.

The Blu 61 is the business card of Italian creativity, that fashion vein which in food also reveals the sense of taste and balance. In a nutshell, all the value of the word beauty. It represents the Italian lifestyle that the whole world envies us. Thanks to Antonio and Giuseppina, a timeless love story has materialized in the form of excellence at the table. A true source of inspiration for all those who still believe in love, true love!

Bernardo Pasquali