Evaluation of Local Cheeses within the Scope of Sustainable Gastronomy Tourism: A case from Niğde

With this study, it’s aimed to reveal and promote the forgotten local cheeses, which are thought to have potential in terms of gastronomy tourism. In the study, document review and semi-structured interview techniques, which are qualitative research methods, were applied, and content analysis was performed as a data analysis method. The study was limited to Niğde province and the participants were selected by snowball sampling method, one of the purposeful sampling methods. At the end of the preliminary interviews, final interviews were held with 10 participants. The interviews were recorded and the findings were written down and the local cheeses of Niğde province [(Niğde Blue Cheese, Niğde White Cheese, Niğde Cappadocia Cave Cheese, Tabal Cheese, Niğde Log Cheese, Niğde Jar Cheese, Niğde Moldy Tulum, Niğde Leather Tulum, Niğde Fresh Cheese and Niğde Tulum Cheese were revealed and listed. As a result of the interviews, most of the participants stated that Niğde cheeses don’t contribute much to sustainable gastronomy tourism; but they have a serious potential, and expressed local cheeses are preferred mostly by middle-aged and older individuals. In addition, at the end of the study, suggestions were made by evaluating the contributions of these local cheeses to sustainable gastronomy tourism.