The dairy Museum

The museum has been set up at the site of Latteria Sociale di Lozzo with the aim of enhancing rural activities and cattle breeding, which were abandoned due to industrialization. In ancient times, women woke up at dawn to work in the stable, to look after the cows, to milk them and to take the milk to the dairy, where the expert cheesemaker (mìstro) transformed it into butter, cheese and ricotta cheese. At sunset, the ritual was repeated and so, day after day, without interruption except for summer, when the cattle were brought to mount (monteà) in Pian Dei Buoi. The dairy allowed everyone to have a good nutrition: for centuries, milk derivaties were, along with beans, the main source of proteins for our people. So it’s very important knowing a know-how which ensured livehood of the inhabitants of the territory. Each village, in fact, had its own dairy which realized its own dairy products; nowadays they’re all closed, with few exceptions in which you can still taste the ancient and special taste of milk transformation done with the traditional method.

In the museum, a targeted educational itinerary allows everyone to discover how milk was processed in ancient and modern times, providing the opportunity to observe the tools, also curious, used in different eras.

A museum’s room is dedicated to montication, with the description of the itineraries and the display of the equipment for milk processing in casère. Photographs of shepherds and mìstro , as well as clothes that they regularly wore (moleskin pants, hemp shirt woven in Lozzo, pèl with which the shepherd protected himself from bad weather and clogs (zòcui) wore daily) complete a fascinating visual narrative.