The Manchegan Sheep
It belongs to one of the few sheep breeds that still maintains its purity today, free of crossbreeding. Its settlement in the region of La Manche dates back to time immemorial and, despite coming from France.
The diversity of the pastures means that the milk obtained has a great variety of nuances, aromas and flavors. This milk has an unbeatable flavor and hence the transformation into a cheese, Manchego, whose peculiarities and characteristics differentiate it from others.
La Mancha
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Don Quixote of La Mancha, Castilla-La Mancha, La Mancha sheep and, of course, Manchego cheese, gladly bear the surname of a land.
The region was an ancient spartan field which the Arabs baptized as Al Ansha -land without water- and which extends from Toledo to the mountains of Cuenca and from the Alcarria to Sierra Morena. An area of 34,380 square kilometers scattered throughout the provinces of Albacete, Ciudad Real, Cuenca and Toledo. The Manchegan sheep that produces the cheese of the same name has its settlement there.
Origin and history of Manchego cheese
Apparently, archaeological discoveries from the Bronze Age reveal that the ancient settlers were already producing Manchego cheese. These remains include the so-called “queseras”, exhibited in the museum of Ciudad Real and coming from the area of Monilla del Azuer, are a type of pots with holes that are believed to have been used for the process of making cheese.
From these indications it is considered that before Christ, in the settlements of the Iberian civilization, a sheep’s cheese was already being elaborated whose raw material came from a breed of sheep that could be considered a predecessor of what we nowadays call Manchegan sheep. This breed has survived the passage of centuries and has done so, rooted to the land or area from which its name originates.
Throughout history there are literary references that associate Manchego cheese with the culture and gastronomy of different periods, thus becoming a symbol of the region and the cultural identity of La Mancha. Although “Don Quixote” is the most famous work in which Manchego cheese is mentioned, there are also references in other literary and gastronomic texts. Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer makes reference to Manchego cheese in his work “A Dead Man”, and in the 20th century in the novel “The Sun Also Rises”, Ernest Hemingway mentions Manchego cheese in a scene in Spain.
At the end of the 19th century, small family farms and cooperatives in the area began to focus on cheese production. Producers took advantage of the growth of the industry to implement cheese-making techniques using milk exclusively from flocks of Manchego sheep, and it was in the 20th century that this advance gave Manchego cheese its enormous and renowned worldwide recognition.
In this way, Manchego cheese, through its ancestral production method, its quality, its flavor, and its presence in literature, has become a symbol of the region of La Mancha and an important cultural element in the history of Spain.
