Cabrales blue cheese is not made in a factory, and until well into the twentieth century it was not reliably made from a single animal’s milk either. It comes from one narrow valley in the Picos de Europa mountains of Asturias, produced from a raw, unpasteurized mix of cow’s, sheep’s, and goat’s milk depending on the season, then carried into natural limestone caves to age for two to six months. Most English-language coverage of Cabrales blue cheese from Spain treats it as an abstraction, a label next to Roquefort and Gorgonzola on a supermarket cheese counter. None of it mentions that the same cheese, made by a named cheesemaker working out of an actual cave near the village of Tielve, is stocked today at a specialty cheese shop in Pamplona and served on a restaurant cheeseboard on the very street where the bulls run each July.
That distinction matters because Cabrales without its backstory just reads as another strong blue cheese sitting next to jamón and membrillo on a board. Knowing where it actually comes from, what the cave does that refrigeration and injected mold cultures never had to replace, and how it differs from its closest relatives, Picón Bejes-Tresviso and French Roquefort, turns the cheese from a strong flavor into a specific, traceable product with legal protection dating to 1981 and centuries of shepherding practice behind that.
This article draws on the published production standards of the Consejo Regulador de la Denominación de Origen Protegida Cabrales, the cheese’s official regulatory body, cross-checked against World Cheese Awards records and independently verified reporting on where the cheese is actually sold and served in Pamplona today.
A Legend, Then Two Centuries of Paper Trail
Asturian tradition tells of a shepherd who left milk stored in a mountain cave after being distracted by a shepherdess, then found it months later transformed into a pungent, blue-veined cheese. It is a good story, and it is exactly that: a legend, not a documented origin. The name Cabrales itself is recorded as a place name as far back as the 12th century, but no written source describes the cheese specifically until the 1700s, when the Enlightenment writer Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos gave it its first confirmed mention.
By the mid-19th century, Cabrales had a firmer paper trail. Pascual Madoz’s Diccionario geográfico-estadístico-histórico de España described the cheese and compared it directly to Roquefort, noting it was already being exported to other Spanish provinces and to the Americas. That comparison to Roquefort is more than a century old, which makes the modern habit of treating Cabrales as a cheap Spanish stand-in for the French cheese both ironic and backward. The two developed in parallel, not in imitation.
Legal protection came in 1981, when Cabrales received its Denominación de Origen, now a full Protected Designation of Origin under EU law. Production is restricted to the Concejo de Cabrales and three neighboring villages in the Concejo de Peñamellera Alta, both within Asturias. The Consejo Regulador de la Denominación de Origen Protegida Cabrales, the cheese’s regulatory council, still administers and certifies every wheel produced inside that boundary.
Three Milks, One Natural Cave
What goes into the cheese depends on the season. Cabrales can be made from pure cow’s milk or from a traditional blend of two or three milks, cow, sheep, and goat, gathered as each animal’s lactation cycle allows. All of it is used raw, unpasteurized, in keeping with the DOP’s artisanal standard.
The defining step happens after the curd is formed. Wheels are carried into natural limestone caves in the Picos de Europa and left to age for two to six months in conditions the maker does not control with machinery: roughly 90 percent relative humidity and a temperature between 7 and 13 degrees Celsius. Those specific, unglamorous numbers are what allow naturally occurring Penicillium molds already living in the cave to colonize the cheese from the inside out, producing the blue-green veining without the needle injection that many industrial blue cheeses rely on. It is a slower, less controllable process than a factory version, and that is precisely the point.
Packaging has changed more than the cheese itself. Wheels were once wrapped in tree leaves as a cheap, practical covering, a method eventually abandoned because it did not meet modern hygiene standards. Today every legitimate wheel is wrapped in green foil, carrying both the individual maker’s label and a numbered counter-label from the Consejo Regulador. A wedge without that counter-label is not certified Cabrales, no matter what the price tag claims.
Not Roquefort, and Not Quite Its Asturian Cousin Either
Cabrales gets lumped into a single “Spanish blue cheese” category more often than any accuracy check would allow. Its closest relative is Picón Bejes-Tresviso, made in the adjoining Liébana region of neighboring Cantabria, close enough in style that the two are frequently confused for each other. The real difference is in the milk: Cabrales is always a cow, sheep, and goat blend when more than one milk is used, while Picón is occasionally made from cow’s milk alone. Both cheeses depend on Penicillium roqueforti for their veining, though Picón tends to show more of an orange-tinted rind fungus, Brevibacterium linens, that Cabrales does not typically develop.
Roquefort is a different animal entirely. France’s protected blue cheese can legally be made only from raw milk of the Lacaune sheep breed, aged specifically in the caves of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon. Cabrales was never restricted to a single milk source, and visually the two cheeses diverge as well: Spanish cave-aged blues like Cabrales tend toward a deep, almost indigo mold color, where Roquefort’s veining reads noticeably greener. Northern Spain has its own tradition of cave-aged, protected-origin cheeses that owe nothing to France and get flattened into the same “Spanish blue” or “Spanish Manchego” shorthand as often as Cabrales does. Navarra’s own Idiazabal, a Basque and Navarran sheep’s milk cheese made under an entirely separate designation, gets mistaken for a purely Basque product in exactly the same way Cabrales gets flattened into a generic “Spanish Roquefort.”
Where to Actually Find Cabrales in Pamplona
Cabrales is not a Navarra or Basque product, and this article makes no claim that it is. But it does turn up, genuinely and verifiably, on Pamplona’s own tables. L’Atelier, the city’s first shop dedicated exclusively to artisanal cheese, operates out of the Iturrama neighborhood and stocks El Teyedu, a Cabrales DOP wheel made by Pepe Bada, a cheesemaker who spent twelve years as president of the Consejo Regulador del Queso Cabrales himself. Bada ages his wheels in a natural cave near Tielve reached partly on horseback, and El Teyedu won the SuperGold award for Best Blue Cheese in the World at the 2016 World Cheese Awards, a credential that puts a serious wheel of cheese within reach of anyone walking into a Pamplona shop.
Restaurante Zanpa, on Calle Estafeta, keeps Cabrales on its regular cheeseboard alongside Mahón, Payoyo, Idiazábal, and a cured sheep’s cheese. Calle Estafeta is not a random address. It is the longest straight stretch of the encierro route itself, which means a wedge of a cave-aged Asturian cheese with a 300-year documented history sits on a menu along the same pavement the bulls cross every morning of San Fermín.
Traditionally, Cabrales is eaten with walnuts and honey, which soften its sharpness, or melted into Asturian cider for a rustic preparation called queso a la sidra. That cider pairing is not incidental. Asturias built an entire drinking culture around its own sidra, and the cheese and the cider come from the same mountainous stretch of northern Spain, developed side by side rather than as a packaged pairing invented for tourists.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Cabrales cheese made of?
Cabrales is made from raw, unpasteurized milk, either pure cow’s milk or a traditional blend of cow, sheep, and goat milk depending on the season. It is aged for two to six months in natural limestone caves in Asturias’ Picos de Europa and has held Protected Designation of Origin status since 1981.
Is Cabrales stronger than Roquefort?
Most tasters and cheesemongers rank Cabrales as more intensely pungent and spicier in aroma than Roquefort, though it is generally less salty. The difference comes down to milk source, since Roquefort uses only raw Lacaune sheep’s milk while Cabrales blends multiple milks, and to the specific cave environments each cheese ages in.
Where can you buy Cabrales cheese in Pamplona?
L’Atelier, a specialty cheese shop in Pamplona’s Iturrama neighborhood, stocks El Teyedu, an award-winning Cabrales DOP wheel made by cheesemaker Pepe Bada. Restaurante Zanpa, on Calle Estafeta along the encierro route, includes Cabrales on its regular cheeseboard.
Is Cabrales cheese pasteurized?
No. The Protected Designation of Origin standard for Cabrales requires raw, unpasteurized milk as part of its artisanal production method, which is one of the reasons the cheese cannot legally be mass-produced outside its certified zone in Asturias.
Every article on the Encierro blog is authored or reviewed by active bull runners with direct experience in Pamplona.