ROCCA DI VALLE DI CASTRIGNANO

It all began in Valle di Castrignano, an ancient borgo in the Parma hills of Langhirano, consisting of numerous buildings dating back to medieval times. In 1910, at the Rocca di Valle di Castrignano, Parmigiano Reggiano was still being cooked by fire. There was a small casello, of typical architecture, for two cauldrons: two cheeses, at that time, came out of the milk every morning and who knows how long this ritual had been going on unchanged between the white walls of the village's medieval towers. The Campelli family, owners of the complex since the early 20th century, as well as of four other estates, three in the Parma plain, Piccionaia, Serafina and Riva Bianca, and one in the hills, il Fornello, was made up of many siblings: Gianni, Clelia, Domenico, Mario and many other people then populated the Rocca, all engaged in farming. The towers and the old architecture, built seven centuries ago with white stones quarried with difficulty from the cultivated land, were then not just the memory of a mysterious past, made up of wars, fables and legends, but a place of production in harmony with the surrounding environment, made up of woods, oaks and extensive cultivation. This is how life flowed in the Rocca, with its rhythms unchanged for centuries. The people, the granaries, the stables, the houses, the woods and the fields of the Campelli family lived together, united by a single purpose: to bring out, every morning, the two wheels of Parmigiano Reggiano cheese from the small casello. Today, the Campelli farm has around three hundred head of cattle, of which 140 are lactating. It owns seventy hectares of land, cultivated for organic fodder, respecting crop rotation, thus alternating alfalfa with cereals. For the past three years, the company has been committed to safeguarding the two Italian cattle breeds closest to extinction, typical of the Parma area and already bred by our farm until the 1950s: the Bardigiana cow and the Langhiranese or Grigia dell'Appennino cow. Producing and selling Parmigiano Reggiano. Every day, for over a hundred years.