We did not take pictures of us at Scuola Mondavio since images of us studying aren't particularly exciting. In fact, the only picture we have from the actual school is this list of common verbs to learn.
Pictures from some of the activities we did with the school, however, are most interesting. There were 3 extracurricular activities. The first of these was visiting a cheese maker in Mondavio. Here is Paul in front of the door.
Claudia is the owner of this small cheese cantina called Le Affinità Gustative. (In Italian, a cantina is a basement room typically used for wine or storing other goods; in English the word is typically used in a different way, for a small pub.) She gave us and two other students from the school a tour. The other students were a married couple Paul (from England) and Astrid (from Holland). They were not in class with us; they bought a home nearby and have classes twice a week. Claudia is wearing the pale blue shirt.
Claudia makes pecorino cheeses, but she does not have her own sheep. She buys the raw cheese from local herders, and then flavors and ages them. The raw cheeses are wrapped in various herbs to impart flavor, then aged in the grotto basement of the building. From her website:
[T]he still fresh cheeses are left to rest for a few months in the grotto which, thanks to its peculiar characteristics, constant temperature and humidity, allows the optimal maturation of a cheese that matures over time.
Modern Italian food safety codes require modern equipment, which Claudia does not use. But they have special permits for foods made via traditional methods, which this is. The cheeses are aged in wooden barrels or ceramic vases.
After the cheeses age for the necessary number of months (which varies depending on the cheese), they are brought upstairs for packaging.
Claudia then brings the cheeses back down into the cool and temperature stable grotto until they are shipped to the restaurants, stores, or final customers.
Of course, the tour included a tasting of various cheeses. Our tasting included Classic (no additional flavorings), Ampelos (with wine vine leaves), Ipogeo (with a secret local herb), Casecc (with walnut leaves), and Maggengo (with hay and acacia flowers) We bought the Ipogeo and the Maggengo, and feel that the Ipogeo is the best.
Our second activity was a cooking class, where we made local specialties. Since we were cooking, we did not take pictures. Antonella was our instructor. Her friend Luanna also helped since she has made handmade pasta since she was a child, and is very good at rolling out the dough. Here is a not particularly attractive photograph of the leftovers; you will have to take our word that they were tasty as well as being more attractive the original time. The foods are, from left to right, Tacconi (a pasta made with fava bean flour), gnocchi with wine and radicchio and walnuts, piadina (a regional type of flat bread), and ciambelline al vino (a cookie). The two pomegranates were from one of the trees in their yard. We also had gratin vegetables and stuffed zucchini.
We went back later in the week to get a proper picture with Antonella and her husband Marciello. They are very nice, and very talented. Marciello built the house, using mostly reclaimed material, and designed it to blend in with the older houses in the area. It was phenomenal.
The third and final activity was a visit to a vineyard, Terracruda. Paul's instructor for the 2nd week of our school, Agnese, brought us to the vineyard. Our guide for the tour was Leanore. From left to right in this photo: Leanore, Paul, and Agnese.
These particular vines were Sangiovese grapes, and a few had not been ripe at harvest but were now, so we got to try some. They are tasty grapes. There were two styles of rows here. One had shorter plants with rows closer together, which is good for modern harvest techniques. The other style (seen above, and below with Paul) are taller plants with the rows further apart. This is an older method of planting that facilitated hand-picking the grapes.
Leanore explained to us some of the techniques of caring for the vines, such as when and how to prune. On the walk back from this vineyard, Paul spotted a very very large bottle for wine.
We were heading back to their main building.
Leanore shored us a map of where their grapevines are.
The wines are fermented in steel ...
... and then some are moved to oak barrels for continued aging.
Terracruda has a special machine for when they make sparkline wine with the champagne method (in-bottle fermentation); this machine removed sediment while keeping the bottles under pressure.
After the tour, we went to their tasting room to - you guessed it - taste some of the wines. The tasting room has a great view.
Terracruda is an organic vineyard. They are part of a small DOC (certified area for a particular type of wine) for Aleatico, an older grape. It was of course one of the wines we tried. While we were not crazy about their Sangiovese wine, we felt the Aleatico was very interesting and we also enjoyed their sparkline brut rose.
Updated January 2024