Podere Collebrado · Val d'Orcia · since 1994
A farm on a hill.
Cheese, bread, and a place for your tent.
Today on the hill
- In Italy it's
- Sunrise
- ≈ 07:35
- Sunset
- ≈ 18:20
- Now
- Weather unavailable right now
- This month on the farm
- Saffron at dawn. Saffron flowers at dawn; the olive harvest begins; truffle hunts start.
The promise
“Everything on the table grew, grazed or was made on this hill.”
Colle means hill. Brado means free-roaming, which is how the animals live here.
02
Who lives here
↑ Tap an animal
03 · Recipe: pecorino, from the meadow
Pasture to plate
Five steps, about three hundred metres, and anywhere from a morning to three months.
The meadow
Out by eight, back by dusk. The flock works the hill for wild thyme, chicory and clover, and moves on before the grass is gone.
Milking
Twice a day, in the old stable, 140 sheep and 25 goats. The morning milk goes straight to the dairy, still warm.
Bianca, no. 41 The dairy
Raw milk, natural rennet, salt. Nothing is pasteurised and nothing is added. Elia cuts the curd by hand; the whey becomes this morning's ricotta.
The ageing room and the pit
Weeks, months, or three months underground in a straw-lined pit. Every wheel is turned by hand, and every wheel comes out a little different.
The table
Twenty steps from the dairy door to the kitchen. The cheese that aged all summer meets bread from this morning's oven.
* The sheep graze meadows full of wild herbs on poor clay. Hungry soil makes stubborn, aromatic herbs, and aromatic herbs make better milk. The milk changes with the seasons, so the cheese does too.
October
Saffron at dawn
Saffron flowers at dawn; the olive harvest begins; truffle hunts start.
04
Esperienze
Classes and tours on a working farm. Every one starts with a walk from the stables to the dairy.
Farm & dairy tour with tasting
The stables, the dairy, the ageing room, then cheese and wine at the table.
Pasta class
Three fresh pastas and their sauces, then lunch or dinner with what you made.
Tuscan cooking class
Fresh pasta, a main with its side, a dessert, and a long meal to finish.
Pizza and bread in the wood oven
Heritage-grain doughs, your own pizza, and the best seat by the oven.
Cheese-making morning
Watch and help Elia make caprino and pecorino. Breakfast is warm ricotta.
05
La Bottega
Cheese, oil, honey and pasta from the hill, in the farm shop and shipped within the EU.
Pit-aged pecorino
€13 / €26
New olive oil
€16 / €65
Wildflower & chestnut honey
€9 / €10
The "Il Colle" box
€75
A Year on the Hill
€38
06
Guest notes
“We booked lunch and stayed until the sheep came home. The ricotta alone is worth the drive.”
“The kids fed the donkeys, then made pizza in the wood oven. Best day of our trip.”
“We parked the van under the cypresses and woke up to the whole valley in fog.”
“The pit-aged pecorino came home in our suitcase. It's already gone.”
* Sample notes for this demo
07
Finding us
You need a car. The last 1.5 km is gravel: fine for normal cars, too narrow for coaches. Free parking. Sat-navs get confused on the white roads, so use the map link below.
- Pienza15 min
- Montepulciano20 min
- Monticchiello15 min
- Bagno Vignoni25 min
- Montalcino40 min
- Chiusi-Chianciano Terme (FS)40 min
Letters from the hill
Four letters a year: the new oil, the first ricotta, the pit cheese, and whatever else happened.