Sbrinz
Sbrinz, the wonder cheese!
This hard Swiss beauty is great for grating, and it's one of your best companions on a cheese board.
It is a cheese of many shapes—on a platter you find it as little cubes called Möckli, or thin rolls. Both the cubes and rolls come in snack packs at the supermarket or kiosk and are perfect to take with you on the train (especially if you've left your Swiss army knife at home). And if you only serve one cheese at an Apèro, make sure it's those salty little Sbrinz cubes.
The cheese itself is centuries old and, according to the Kulinarisches Erbe, there is already mention of Brienzer Käse in 1530. The name may come from an Italian dialect word for hard cheese, sbrinzo, but the better origin story links it to the town of Brienz, where exported cheeses were brought before their journey over the Alps in the 16th and 17th centuries. There is even a Sbrinz Route that you can hike through the Alps as they did (while carrying great wheels of cheese) many years ago. (Here's the hiking guide in English).
Sbrinz has been an AOP protected product since 2002. For a fully mature and super flavourful Sbrinz it can take up to two years of ripening.
The Swiss often use Sbrinz as a replacement for Parmesan in recipes. It differs slightly from its Italian cousin because it contains more fat and is therefore not quite as brittle.
