If you could be a fly on the wall during cheesemongers' therapy sessions, you might hear a recurring nightmare: I sat down to dinner and asked for Parmigiano. The waiter brought a green cardboard cylinder filled with... with... I can't go on, it's too painful. And once you've tried the real Parmigiano-Reggiano, you'll never go back to that acrid, powdery Parmesan, either. Every eighty pound wheel is stamped with the date of production, and a repeating Parmigiano-Reggiano to verify authenticity. It is worth noting that the leftover whey is fed to the hogs fortunate enough to become future legs of proscuitto di Parma. Parmigiano-Reggiano is available at twelve months, but we like it best between twenty and thirty months, depending on the month of production. By then, the café au lait-colored insides have dried to crunchy perfection: nutty, spicy, salty (but not too much so), and floral, with a distinct caramel finish. Older isn't always better. We find the rare super-aged wheels at three to five years are often sandy, dry, and excessively salty, without the nuanced complexity that makes this cheese great. A sublime cheese, truly at home with the dry berry sparkle of regional Lambrusco.