Diakoumis Cheese Products

located in Kalamata's Municipal Market, The Diakoumis Cheese Shop is where you can buy the products of one of the oldest cheese and olive oil producers in the region.

Diakoumis senior started the family firm at Kopana that in 1963 and since then his sons have been modernizing and expanding it. You can try all the company cheeses there, such as feta, graviera, kefalograviera, sfela (a local PDO product), goat cheese, myzithra and anthotyro (soft white fresh cheeses), armi (a brined cheese) and apladi (a hard cheese used for grilling and frying), plus their exquisite extra virgin olive oil of Kalamata (another PDO product from Kalamon olives) and their famous Kalamon olives.

Their barrel-aged feta is prepared at the plant exclusively from 100% fresh sheep and goats' milk from the Triphylia mountains. It is aged in beech-wood barrels for at least three months in a natural brine where it is stored until consumption. It has a hard texture, subtly sour taste with intense flavor.

Their Engraving and Kefalograviera are also produced exclusively from sheep and goats' milk and aged for at least three months under special conditions before being sold but some of the production is aged up to 12 months so that it gradually acquires a rich aroma and an especially rich and slightly sweet taste .

Apladi is a hard cheese that is wonderful grilled or fried. You can even place it directly on hot coals without it melting (only the inside softens). And it needs neither oil nor butter in the frying pan. It lends itself to 'gourmet' embellishments like balsamic vinegar, fig syrup, jam, caramelised fruit, and the like.

Other ideas are to serve the graviera with hot pepper flakes or with a sprinkling of dried herbs. This turns it into a table cheese, with a spicy or herbal taste and rich aromas.

THE LANGUAGE is the brand name of their extra virgin olive oil which is made directly from newly harvested olives using the cold pressed, 'heatless' method at their own press and their BRINIZA is another 'heatless' extra virgin olive oil made from the Koroneiki olive in Messinia.

The company produces'agourelaio', a thick green oil made from early harvest Koroneiki olives, almost like a' fresh olive juice '.