Stories of taste, from humble polenta to gourmet cuisine

At Malga Millegrobe, on the meadow dominated by the Vaia Deer, another work of land art created by Marco Martalar, the competition organized by the Pult Brotherhood takes place: the aim is to celebrate the most typical dish of the entire Alpe Cimbra, made with potatoes, sautéed leek, lard and lard, mixed with toasted or toasted white flour. It is served with roe deer or tonco de luganega, all accompanied with cabbage.

“There are 12 competitors and 10 jurors,” explains Massimo Osele, grand master of the Confraternity of Potato Polenta, founded when poverty was such that even the grain of polenta was replaced with a less expensive ingredient. This mountain hut overlooks a cross-country skiing center with a 40 kilometer route.

There are those who, like Luca Zotti, chef of the Lusernarhof restaurant, have made the products of this land a flag, becoming an ambassador of taste. The restaurant managed by the chef with his brother Andrea and mother Dolores (father Bruno was the founder), is a sun-kissed veranda overlooking the Val d'Astico and often on the flocks of grazing sheep. “In Luserna there are only 200 of us, but there are nine restaurants. Our cuisine allows us to differentiate the offer", summarizes Andrea. From the hands of chef Luca, a degree in natural sciences followed by a fascination with cooking and a course of study which passed from Alma to the Le Calandre restaurant (3 Michelin stars) with chef Massimiliano Alajmo, even an egg and cardoncelli becomes a masterpiece of taste. “I bring the story of my mountains to my plate,” he says. And if from September to Easter the Lusernarhof remains a haven of refined and creative cuisine on Alpe Cimbra among fried lichens, chanterelles, porcini mushrooms and wild berries, in the other months the family closes to dedicate itself to street food at the Christmas markets in Trento. “Let's make the potato tortel in a variation of a stroll,” concludes Luca.

The cows whose milk is used to produce Vezzena cheese, a Slow Food presidium, come to graze just a stone's throw away. The milk is brought by five farmers who are members of the Caseificio degli Altipiani e del Vezzena, led by Marisa Corradi, to be processed by a very young cheesemaker, Federico Lorenzin, 23 years old, and two assistants. It is the smallest cooperative in Trentino and has a flagship: the Vezzena di Lavarone cheese, a Slow Food presidium. It is produced with partially skimmed raw milk, in the summer period mountain milk is produced, while in the rest of the year hay milk is used. The dairy produces 600 wheels per month.

You are spoiled for choice between cabins, apartments and hotels. Among the oldest in Folgaria, the Club Alpino hotel, founded in 1902 with only three rooms, today three stars and eco-friendly, managed for four generations by the Struffi family. Among the new features is the 4-star Essenza Alpina campsite, also in Folgaria, with Turkish bath and Nordic sauna (swimsuits are banned here): open a year ago in refined Alpine style, it offers wellness rituals such as the Aufguss, an experience of purification and relaxation through the scents of the essences and the harmonious movements of the master, in this case a teacher, Sara Della Giacoma, who manages the plant with her husband Nicola Bailoni

The Vigolana Plateau, a few kilometers from Trento, is a widespread municipality of over five thousand souls born from the union of four different municipalities. The town hall is located in Vigolo Vattaro, birthplace of Santa Paolina Amabile Visintainer, known as the patron saint of Trentino emigrants. Born into a very poor family, she emigrated to Brazil as a child, where from a humble girl she became the founder of the congregation of the Little Nuns of the Immaculate Conception. Alone, she founded 450 educational and shelter homes for the elderly, as well as an order present on three continents, and was proclaimed a saint, the first in Trentino, by John Paul II in 2002. “She is the symbol of emigration - explains the deputy mayor, Michela Pacchialet -. Here we have her birthplace, the nuns and a reception system for the many emigrants who want to return to their land in search of their roots. Last year alone we welcomed 650. 60,000 people left Trentino, today there are 2 million people from Trentino in Brazil." Next year will mark 150 years since the first migration.

Today the descendants of those very poor men and women return to Italy and find here the leading town of the so-called "Roots Tourism", with an itinerary in the town that passes from the old spinning mill to the town hall, former home of Maria Callas, whose first husband Giovanni Battista Meneghini had a factory right here, to develop, passing from the small church of San Rocco and the villas, up to the Bosco delle roots, where emigrants can plant a tree: a symbol of hope on the roots broken by the Vaia storm.