Caciocavallo irpino di grotta* is a spheroidal cheese whose usual piece weighs about two kilograms and can reach ten. Regione Campania places it in Avellino country: the Ufita valley, mountain stretches of the Ofanto, Alta Irpinia and the Terminio Cervialto. That geography is the first reason to pause over it—the form is not a souvenir, but a compact of those uplands.
Through spring and summer the cattle stay on grass. When the pastures run out, the ration leans on farm-grown forages and meals, with silage kept out of the diet. The milk therefore carries a clear seasonal swing: open grazing first, then a closed, forage-led winter without fermented bulk feed.
Maturation is allowed to run from forty-five or sixty days well beyond six months. Early on, the scent still reads as milk with grass and hay; as time lengthens, a quieter aged perfume comes forward. That arc—from pasture to cave, from milky greenness to a softer depth—is the practical cue for anyone choosing a piece: decide how far along the aging you want the aroma to have travelled.