Tete de Moine
Tête de Moine ( / tɛt də mwan / , French for “monk's head”) is a semi-hard cheese made from untreated cow's milk in the Bernese Jura and in the canton of Jura .
Its origins go back to the 12th century in the Bellelay monastery . Since 2001, the name “Tête de Moine, Fromage de Bellelay” has been registered as a protected designation of origin ( Appellation d'Origine Protégée (AOP)).
Traditionally, Tête de Moine is not cut into slices, but rather finely scraped. A special tool, the Girolle , has been available for this purpose since 1982 . This usually consists of a round wooden plate with a vertical pin in the middle and a crank. The cylindrical cheese is placed in the middle of the pin; beforehand, however, the rind is cut away from the top of the cheese, which is then reminiscent of a tonsure that gave the cheese its name. With the help of the crank placed on the pin, rosettes can now be made from finely scraped cheese. The enlarged surface brings out the taste in particular. When scraping, the cheese rind loosens at the edge and crumbles. The scraper got its name from the appearance of the rosettes, which are reminiscent of chanterelles (French girolle ).
The pirouette was developed for beginners and as a gift , in which the cheese is sold together with a disposable girolle. If the storage box is unpacked, the saucer folds open and only the Girolle needs to be attached.
Web links
- Tête de Moine AOC website
- Tête de Moine, Fromage de Bellelay (GUB) on the website of the Federal Office for Agriculture
- Tête de Moine on the Agroscope website
- Website of a cheese dairy with a short film about the production of Tête de Moine
- Tête de Moine in the Swiss Culinary Heritage database(French)