Mascarpone

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Mascarpone is a triple-cream cheese (though more accurately a lightly-whipped cream) made from crème fraîche, denatured with tartaric acid.^[1] Sometimes buttermilk is added as well, depending on the brand. After denaturation, whey is removed without pressing or aging.^[2] One can manufacture mascarpone by using cream, tartaric or citric acid, or even lemon juice.^[3]

Mascarpone is milky-white in color and is easily spread. When fresh, it smells like milk and cream. It is used in various dishes of the Lombardy region of Italy, where it is a specialty. It is a main ingredient of tiramisu. It is sometimes used instead of butter or Parmesan cheese to thicken and enrich risotti.

[edit] Origins

Mascarpone apparently originated in the area between Lodi and Abbiategrasso, Italy, southwest of Milan, probably in the late 16th or early 17th century. The name is said to come from mascarpa, a milk product made from the whey of stracchino (aged cheese), or from mascarpia, the word in the local dialect for ricotta (although mascarpone is not made from whey, as is ricotta).^[2]

According to cuisine expert and journalist Gianni Brera, the correct name of the cheese should be mascherpone (also credited as a dismissed variant of the word), originally stemming from Cascina Mascherpa, a farmhouse no longer existing once located halfway between Milan and Pavia, belonging to the Mascherpa family.^{[citation needed]}

Mascarpone has an extremely similar taste and quality to Iraqi Gaymer (sometimes spelled "Geimer").^{[citation needed]}

According to popular cheese reference website cheese.com, "[Mascarpone] is not cheese at all, but rather the result of a culture being added to the cream skimmed off the milk, used in the production of Parmesan." ^[1]