Why Asiago cheese is officially protected in Japan

Vicenza Japan: Why Asiago Cheese Is Officially Protected In Japan

At around 1,000 metres above sea level, north of Vicenza, Asiago is both a mountain town and the name of one of Italy’s best known cheeses. Japan has its own official description of it: Asiago is protected there as a geographical indication, while Suntory’s Japanese cheese encyclopedia introduces readers to its Vicenza mountain home, its younger Pressato and its long aged forms.

The Story

Drive north from Vicenza and the road climbs towards the Altopiano di Asiago, the Asiago Plateau, a high mountain area of forests, pasture and dairy farms. Asiago town stands at about 1,000 metres, in the centre of the plateau that gave the cheese its name.

For Japanese readers, this is not simply another Italian cheese name on a supermarket label.

Japan’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries officially protects Asiago as a geographical indication, GI designation No. 31, recognised in Japan since 1 February 2019. Its Japanese dossier identifies the production area across Vicenza, Trento, Padua and Treviso and explains the two principal families of cheese, younger pressed Asiago and aged Asiago, down to maturation, texture, weight and flavour.

The mountain version has an even tighter connection to altitude. Asiago PDO carrying the Product of the Mountain designation must use mountain milk and be processed and matured above 600 metres. The younger cheese is soft, milky and lightly acidic; longer ageing produces firmer cheeses with notes moving towards hay, nuts and spice.

How Japan Describes Asiago

Suntory gives the cheese a different kind of Japanese introduction.

Its World Cheese Encyclopedia places Asiago’s birthplace on a plateau at 1,000 metres north of Vicenza, then explains the contrast between Pressato, the younger, softer cheese, and the older d’Allevo style. The Pressato entry describes restrained salt, fresh milk sweetness and an easy melting texture, before pairing it, rather unexpectedly, with Chablis.

That small detail is one of the reasons we like the Japanese material: readers thousands of kilometres away are being given not only the name Asiago, but Vicenza, altitude, ageing and the difference between eating it young and waiting.

Try It At The Source

On the plateau, order more than one age if you can.

ASIAGO FRESCO Young, soft and milky, matured from around 20 days. ASIAGO MEZZANO Four to ten months, firmer, with butter, hay and nut notes.

ASIAGO VECCHIO Ten to fifteen months, grainier and more savoury. ASIAGO STRAVECCHIO More than fifteen months, produced in smaller quantities, with a crumbly texture and stronger notes of nuts and spice.

If the label says Prodotto della Montagna, Product of the Mountain, the milk, cheesemaking and maturation meet the rules for mountain production.