When you're looking for the perfect cheese to melt on burgers, over sandwiches, onto pasta, or as fondue, fontal cheese is a fantastic fit. Closely related to fontina, a slightly sweet Italian cheese, fontal is a mild-flavored cow's milk cheese that melts with the best of them. The supple texture and sweet, buttery taste of fontal cheese enhance any dish with creamy goodness, and its ability to absorb the flavor of herbs and spices rubbed into its rind is legendary. When fontal is in the kitchen, you'll be ready to handle any challenge where cheese is involved.
Cello Cheese, an artisan cheese company from Turtle Lake, produces some of the finest fontal cheese in America. Handcrafted and carefully shelf cured, fontal cheeses from Cello Cheese come in a range of hand-rubbed varieties – from pumpkin spice and Tuscan herbs to bergamot tea and hibiscus flowers. These full-flavored cheeses are the stars of any grazing board and add kick to the flavor profile of fondues, sauces, omelets, and mac and cheese.
Fontal cheese is a semi-hard variety made from cow's milk with a mild, slightly sweet flavor, a pale yellow color, and a soft, creamy texture. Typically aged for 90 days or less, fontal has a high moisture content that lets it melt easily on bread, pasta, dips, sauces, sandwiches, and burgers.
Fontal has a famously mild, milky, slightly sweet flavor with just a hint of acidity and spice.
To make fontal, cheesemakers curdle raw or pasteurized cow's milk, chopping and cooking the curds at around 50° C. After pressing the curd to drain the whey, the cheese is salted and brushed for a month and allowed to ripen in a very humid environment.
Fontina cheese is a Protected Designated of Origin (PDO) cheese made with the milk of cows that graze on the alpine grasses of the Aosta Valley in northwestern Italy. Originally, fontina was aged in local caves for 3 to 5 months, where low temperatures and high humidity helped to produce a mild-flavored cheese with excellent melting properties. Any cheese that's made with a similar process outside of the Aosta Valley must be called by a different name – which is how fontal cheese was born.
Because it is aged in a humid environment for 90 days or less, fontal has a high moisture content, which makes it easy to melt. The longer a cheese matures, the drier it becomes, making it more difficult to melt.
The mild flavor of fontal cheese lets it pair easily with lots of wines, beers, and cheese board ingredients.
Fontal is an agreeable cheese that allows big-flavored, aromatic wines to shine. Try a barolo, barbaresco, nebbiolo, chianti, montepulciano, or cabernet sauvignon. For whites, a vouvray, chardonnay, or riesling will do. If you're in the mood for beer, a bock, saison, or fruity lambic will shine when paired with fontal cheese. For something stronger, try a port or sherry.
It's hard to go wrong when cooking with a mild and slightly sweet cheese like fontal. It's great in au gratin potatoes and perfect on polenta and pizza. You can layer it in lasagna, melt it on burgers, or smother it over a warm chicken sandwich. On the cheese board, fontina's slightly sweet flavor pairs well with chocolate, as well as dark fruits like dates and figs.
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