Shepherds' folds · Bucovina
Caș, urdă, balmoș and jintiță, how they come into being in front of you, and the folds that take visitors.
At a sheepfold you don't order food. It is made in front of you, in the order in which milk comes apart: first the caș, then the urdă from the whey that is left, and last the jintiță, which the shepherds drink warm. Nothing that reaches the table was, two hours ago, anything other than milk.
This is not a restaurant with rustic decor. It is a hut with a hearth that burns day and night, fir shelves above it, and the smell of smoke travels home with you, in everything you have on your shoulders.
Eight folds and places that take visitors, with phone number and season. Distances are from our gate, in Câmpulung Moldovenesc.
Vatra Dornei, Suceava County
You get there by chairlift from town, with no car and no hiking. It is the simplest way into the world of the fold, good if you have small children or little time.
What you eat
Str. Valea Pintei, Dorna Candreni, Suceava county
One of the few open in winter too. You won't see milking in December, but you see the hut, the hearth and how life is lived up there out of season.
The menu
Agreed when you book. You call and ask what there is that day: at a fold they cook from whatever the milk gave that morning.
Ciocănești, Suceava County
Four folds run by the „Suhardul” livestock breeders' association of Ciocănești. The second number is the information centre in Ciocănești, where they know which of them is up on the mountain and taking visitors that day.
The menu
Agreed when you book. You call and ask what there is that day: at a fold they cook from whatever the milk gave that morning.
Ciocănești, Suceava County
Here you can stand beside the shepherds at the milking and follow the cheese from the first drop of milk to the last piece, and at the end you eat balmoș and urdă. The visit is arranged through the guesthouses in Ciocănești.
What you eat
Șaru Dornei, Suceava County
A shepherd's meal to order, in the heart of the Călimani. It goes well with a day in the national park.
The menu
Agreed when you book. You call and ask what there is that day: at a fold they cook from whatever the milk gave that morning.
Ciocănești, Suceava County
The version with a roof over your head: the same dishes, served at the guesthouse, for anyone who doesn't want to climb to the fold.
The menu
Agreed when you book. You call and ask what there is that day: at a fold they cook from whatever the milk gave that morning.
Poiana Negrii, Dorna Candrenilor, Suceava county
On the Via Transilvanica, at the end of the Vatra Dornei – Poiana Negri stage. If you are walking the trail, this is the meal waiting for you in the evening.
The menu
Agreed when you book. You call and ask what there is that day: at a fold they cook from whatever the milk gave that morning.
Sadova, Suceava County
Not a fold on the mountain but a village dairy, working milk brought down from the pastures of Sadova and Pojorâta. Here you buy rather than watch: caș, telemea, butter, sour cream, yoghurt. It is the closest one to us.
What you eat
The phone numbers and seasons above are those published by the Țara Dornelor Ecotourism Association and by the hosts themselves, checked in September 2026. „May – September” is the range they announce; the exact date the sheep go up and come down changes every year, with the snowmelt, so call before you set off. Distances are estimated by road from our gate.
Eight things, in the order they emerge from the same cauldron of milk.
the first thing milk gives up
30 minutes after milking
The milk, just drawn and still quick with the animal's warmth, takes rennet and is left in peace. Within half an hour it parts into two worlds: one white and dense, which gathers itself, and one greenish, which stays above. The shepherd sinks his hands into the cauldron, lifts the curd like dough, gathers it in a cloth and hangs it to drain. What is left in his palms is caș: sweet, unsalted, tasting of grass and smoke.
Eaten that same day, cut thick, with warm polenta.
the second life of the whey
an hour after the caș
The whey left after the caș looks like water to throw away. The shepherd puts it back on the fire and brings it close to the boil. Then, on the surface, a white and delicate cloud rises that a moment before was not there. It is lifted with a spoon, settled into a cloth and left to drain. Urdă is everything the milk still kept for itself after it had given the caș: sweet, light, almost sugary.
Plain, with dill, or mixed with sour cream over polenta.
polenta boiled in cream, not in water
40 minutes over the cauldron
No water goes in. Thick sour cream goes into the cauldron and is left to come to the boil until the butter starts to rise. Only then is the maize flour scattered in, by hand, in a thin rain, stirred always the same way. The mixture thickens and turns golden, and towards the end pieces of caș are broken into it and melt into threads. Balmoș is polenta taken to its furthest point: rich, heavy, made by shepherds.
Eaten straight from the cauldron, scalding hot, with a wooden spoon.
what stays in the cauldron after the urdă
as long as the urdă takes
Once the urdă has risen and been lifted off, a yellowish liquid stays in the cauldron, with eyes of fat at the surface. That is jintiță. The shepherds drink it warm, straight from the cup, because it is the last thing the milk has to give. It tastes of melted cheese and smoke, it is slightly sour, and it takes the unaccustomed by surprise.
Drunk warm, on the day it is made. By the next day it is gone.
the caș that had time to settle
from two days to two weeks
Caș left to mature for a few days turns crumbly and sharper in taste. It is then broken into pieces, salted and kneaded by hand until it becomes one mass again. It is pressed into a fir bark vessel or a wooden tub and left in the cold. The kneading is not a formality: it breaks the structure and lets the salt reach everywhere, and the cheese takes on that sharpness that caș does not have.
It keeps for months. With onion and dark bread.
cream beaten until it breaks
20 minutes of churning
The cream goes into the churn and is beaten with the plunger, up and down, for minutes on end. At first nothing happens. Then, suddenly, the emulsion gives way: the fat gathers into yellow grains and the rest turns to buttermilk, thin and slightly sour. The grains are gathered, washed in cold water and worked by hand until all the water is out. Sheepfold butter is yellow, not white, because the cow ate grass, not feed.
On warm polenta, where it melts before it reaches your mouth.
over flame, not over a hob ring
25 minutes
The cast-iron cauldron hangs over an open fire, not on a hotplate. The water boils unevenly and the maize flour goes in like rain, with salt, stirred with the wooden stick until not a single lump is left. The difference is made by the bottom of the cauldron, which gets hotter than any pan could: that is where the golden crust forms, the one the shepherds break off at the end and eat on its own.
Turned out onto the wooden board and cut with thread, never with a knife.
fir smoke, four days
three or four days above the hearth
The drained caș is set on shelves, high up in the hut, directly above the hearth that burns day and night. Fir smoke rises slowly and wraps around it. In three or four days the rind turns orange and hard, while the inside stays soft. The smoke is not only flavour: it dries the surface and seals it, and the cheese survives on the mountain all season, with no fridge.
Sliced thin, like cured meat. It travels in a rucksack without spoiling.
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Via Transilvanica