Dairy
Mozzarella
Mozzarella is a fresh pasta filata cheese: the curd is heated in hot water or whey and stretched until it becomes elastic, then formed into balls, loaves, or blocks and kept in brine or whey. Cow’s-milk mozzarella (widely sold as fior di latte when made in the Italian fresh style) is milder and higher-volume than traditional water-buffalo mozzarella, with a soft, milky paste that melts and stretches under heat. It is essential for pizza, caprese, salads, and baked dishes. Industrial low-moisture blocks differ from high-moisture fresh balls; all share the stretched-curd structure that defines the pasta filata family including scamorza, provolone, and burrata’s outer shell.
Also known as: Fior di latte-style cow mozzarella, Low-moisture mozzarella, Mozzarella fresca
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History
Stretched-curd cheeses of southern Italy, especially Campania and surrounds, established the pasta filata tradition later called mozzarella.
Fresh spun cheeses became everyday fare in the Kingdom of Naples, with buffalo milk dominant in marshland dairies and cow milk used inland.
Pizza Margherita in Naples popularised cow and buffalo mozzarella as the defining melt cheese of Neapolitan pizza.
Low-moisture cow’s-milk mozzarella industrialised for American pizza chains and frozen food manufacturing.
Mozzarella di Bufala Campana received PDO protection; cow’s-milk mozzarella remained a separate, largely unprotected category.
Fresh cow mozzarella and low-moisture pizza cheese together made mozzarella one of the world’s most produced cheese styles.