Chechil vs Tenili
Chechil
Facts
- Milk
- Cow
- Texture
- Semi-soft
- Type
- Stretched curd
- Rind
- No rind
- Country
- Armenia
- Place
- Armenian Highlands
Chechil is a brined string cheese from Armenia, made in the Armenian Highlands. Makers pull the curd into thin strands and braid or coil them into dense ropes. The usual milk is cow's milk, often skimmed, so the cheese is lean and chewy rather than rich. Some ropes are only salted in brine. Others are smoked, which adds a dry, brown edge to the braid.
Tenili
Facts
- Texture
- Semi-soft
- Type
- Stretched curd
- Rind
- No rind
- Country
- Georgia
- Place
- Meskheti
Tenili is a traditional cheese from Meskheti, in Georgia, built as a mass of very fine strands. Makers stretch warm curd again and again until it looks like threads, then pack those threads tightly into a clay pot. Cream skimmed at the start goes back over the strands. The Georgian name refers to cheese pressed or stuffed into that pot. It is a feast cheese, made in small amounts because the work is slow.