Montebore Piedmontese Slow Food Presidium half form

Montebore Piedmontese Slow Food Presidium half form

The Piedmont Montébore from the Vallenostra Agricultural Cooperative is a true delicacy! It is a truly unique cheese that has managed to survive the passing of centuries and to overcome moments of difficulty in which it risked extinction forever.

This cheese takes its name from the homonymous village, a fraction of the municipality of Dernice, in the Val Curone in the province of Alessandria, a watershed between the Grue and Borbera valleys, where it has been produced for centuries. It is made using a mixture of raw cow's milk (75%) and sheep's milk (25%), an element that gives it a unique and inimitable flavor.

Its curious shape, which resembles a classic wedding cake with multiple layers, is thought to have been created inspired by the ancient ruin tower that is located in the Montébore castle and is generally created by stacking three robiola cheeses of decreasing diameter.
 

The Montébore: its history

This cheese has a centuries-old history, and its origins are thought to date back to the Low Middle Ages, more precisely to the IX century, and are connected to the dairy art mastered with great skill by the monks of the Benedictine abbey of Santa Maria di Vendersi located on mount Giarolo.

However, the production of Piedmont Montébore suddenly ceased in the second post-war period, a time that saw a massive emigration from the valleys to the cities, a phenomenon that risked causing the loss of all those peasant traditions that had long been a symbol of the identity of an entire territory.

Only in more recent times, specifically in 1999, Maurizio Fava, who is responsible for the local Slow Food Presidium, managed to trace Carolina Bracco, the last custodian of the recipe and traditional cheesemaking technique, and to bring back the Montébore to the glory of the past reviving its production.

The Vallenostra Agricultural Cooperative was the first producer in Italy, according to the regulations, to market the Slow Food Montébore Presidium.

Montebore Piedmontese Slow Food Presidium half form: How is it produced

Prodotto con latte crudo vaccino e ovino, subisce una coagulazione presamica a 35-37 gradi. Viene poi salato con sale marino di Cervia e in questa fase le formine, di diametro decrescente, vengono sovrapposte fino a formare la classica torta nuziale. Generalmente la "torta" ha 3 piani ma alcune volte viene prodotto anche con 5.
Stagiona da 20 a 150 giorni assumendo consistenza sempre più corposa man mano che trascorrono i giorni.

Società Cooperativa Agricola Vallenostra, Piedmont

Ingredients Montebore Piedmontese Slow Food Presidium half form

Ingredients: Raw cow and sheep milk from Italy, salt, rennet, lactic ferments.
It may also contain small percentages of raw goat milk.

Nutritional values

Average nutritional values per 100g
Energy 361 kcal/1511 KJ
Fat 28.97g of which saturates 17.9g
Carbohydrates 0.03g of which sugars 0.03g
Proteins 22.7g
Salt 1.12g
Ash 2.28g