Behold in pictorial form just a few hundred of the thousands of cheeses we saw and sampled at Bra Cheese 2025, all in the name of thorough research and seeking out delicious dairy. Hosted by Slow Food every two years, this festival in Piedmont, Italy is the world’s biggest celebration of raw milk cheese. Makers and mongers, producers and punters all gather to honour tradition, sustainability, terroir and taste.
The event is not only focused on the final product, but the ecosystem that orbits and overlaps this varied foodstuff: landscapes, regions, cultures; farmers, cheesemakers, affineurs; cows, sheep, goats; biodiversity, AOC regulations . . . Its aims are many, but acknowledging and protecting refined methods and heritage is uppermost – as is delighting in the rich results.
We’d taken the train to Bra from Turin, where departure boards declared travel to well-known wine regions Alba and Asti. Very tempting, but we were here for cheese (albeit many made in the area are drunken – soaked in local wine). The platform teemed with cheese tote bags and rang with British voices, whereas we mostly heard only Italian in Turin, with an occasional smattering of French. Less than an hour later we approached the humming mega-market that Bra had become.
The hot and humid metropolis of tents and tradespeople was mapped according to Italian regions, with an emphasis on Piedmont, as well as vast parades dedicated to other countries. Our first bite of the day was a dessert-spoon scoop of mountain butter on a gossamer disc of bread. Mouth full of this fresh double cream masquerading as butter, we gawped at laden stalls. There was Parmesan, Pecorino and Ricotta every age and style imaginable, many with extra bells and whistles: coated, rolled, washed, soaked. We strolled along Affineur Alley, stopping by Neal’s Yard Dairy, Mons, Marcel Petite and several more familiar friends. And popping up between piles of cheese was, in no particular order: beer, wine, honey, preserves, pasta, Bra sausage, charcuterie, just-milk gelato, aligot, garlic and nuts.
But we were on a mission to find two specific cheese stands for prearranged tastings. First we met with Enrico Rosso of Caseificio Rosso, a family-run dairy in the Biella Alpine valleys of Piedmont. We took a tour of two boards, tasting through Maccagno (semi-soft, creme fraiche flavour), Maccagno with beer (5%, directly into the milk), Toma da Polenta (excellent in, you guessed it, polenta), Madame Reale (farmy, with a long finish), Roch (looks like Parmesan, tastes more like Gouda: rich butterscotch), Castel Rosso (somehow both crumbly and creamy), Gratin Blu three ways: the base cheese, with beer, and with Barbera d’Asti (three weeks under wine, striking purple rind).
Then we turned to another Piedmontese cheesemaker, Francesco Rabbia, a strictly raw milk dairy in Cuneo. Francesco talked us through his samples, which included Raschera, a mix of cow and goat milk (and square-shaped so that it’s easier to transport by donkey) and Blu di Cuneo. This creamy blue is made using both Gorgonzola and Roquefort techniques, giving it the softer, sweeter start of the former and sharper finish of the latter.
If we were to list all that we tasted throughout the day, we’d be looking at reams as tall as a Parmesan. A yielding slice of the bright-rinded Mahón from Menorca was one highlight, and we ended with an extremely aged mountain toma that was not for the faint-hearted and called for a crisp, cold beer before boarding the train back to the city.
Turin is – delightfully – the birthplace of both vermouth and gianduja chocolate. (We happen to sell both at Buchanans Cheesemonger and Wine Room.) Gianduja is a blend of cocoa, sugar and at least 30% hazelnut paste – cocoa had a very high cost in the 1800s, so it was bulked out with the area’s prized hazelnuts to revelatory effect – and is named after a carnival mask that represents the spirit of Piedmont, known for his love of wine, good food and company.
We stayed in the Guardinfanti district, where the repeated image of a bulbous-skirted woman is suspended above the narrow streets. Until the nineteenth century, the shops in this area sold the large bell-shaped frames that noblewomen wore under their dresses. The idea was to protect them during pregnancy, but the striking look soon became a fashion statement. We donned more practical attire to walk the streets of Turin, tracking down exemplary coffee, obligatory pasta (with bonus packets of Grana Padano flakes), chocolate shops and vermouth bars.
One bar we had earmarked was Vermuttino, where we sipped both red and white styles of this aromatised fortified wine, barman’s pick. He conjured rounds of olives, crisps, and drinks over ice: a warming but fresh Bèrto Ross da Travaj from Quaglia, a slightly sweeter orange-peel Strucchi Rosso, a marmalade-coloured viognier-based drop by the name of La Vagabonda, and a classic Cocchi Americano, produced in Asti. Vermuttino is a beautiful small cathedral of a bar, one in which we gladly paid devotion. (It should be noted that we also visited an actual church earlier in the day, equally stunning.) A Saturday of consuming and celebrating cheese followed by an aperitivo Sunday afternoon galvanised us for the plane journey home.
