Story: The Special Taste of Pecorino

At three weeks, a soft coating of mould known as ‘the cat's fur’ has formed on the pecorino. It's carefully washed off before the cheese is moved to the shelf to continue ripening.

Giovanni Cannas learned how to make pecorino from his parents and grandparents.

A driveway lined with cypresses and almost two kilometres long, leads up a hill from the Era river valley to Fattoria Lischeto. From afar, its dairy, restaurant, few auxiliary buildings, and a hotel and pool, make it look almost like a small hamlet in itself. To the south-west, the mediaeval city of Volterra lies within sight, while you can see the Mediterranean on the western horizon. It's a classic Tuscan estate – generous and picturesque, even if the odd corner looks like it could do with sprucing up a little, as is the case for many of the region's houses.

Giovanni Cannas greets us with characteristic Italian geniality. His face is marked by smile lines, his narrow eyes sparkle. He holds a cigarette in his hand that rarely seems to go out. Our later conversations confirm what is immediately apparent: the fifty-eight-year-old loves life and everything it offers, from music and dancing to attractive women and good food. He's Italian, after all – warm, relaxed, and appreciative of the good things in life.”

Giovanni looks out over the meadows and casts an eye over his flock. Nearly eight hundred sheep roam across the 150 hectares of land, enjoying the lush grass of the Tuscan hills. “Sheep are so easy-going and peaceful. They radiate an incredible sense of calm and contentness.”

You can tell he is deeply invested in the health and happiness of the animals. That's partly, because they provide the precious raw ingredient that he has been transforming into his acclaimed organic pecorino cheeses for thirty years. “The art of cheesemaking combines skilled craftsmanship with the preservation of ancient traditions,” he says.

No one understands long family tradition better than Giovanni Cannas. He comes from a long line of shepherds. His father, grandfather, and even his great-grandfather earned a living by raising sheep in Sardinia. Due to the difficult living conditions for sheep farmers, high levels of competition, and sparse vegetation on the island, in the early sixties the family moved to Tuscany with their flock of 2,000.

The terrain may have changed, but their traditions remained. With the men tending to the sheep in the meadows, it was primarily the women of the family who were responsible for producing the cheese. But a new era began with Giovanni and his younger sister Rosita, who today manages Fattoria Lischeto's business affairs. Giovanni reminisces, “It was my grandmother who taught me the secrets of cheesemaking when I was eight.”

The way Giovanni followed his own interests at eighteen may have been the spark that ignited Fattoria Lischeto's success. His love for dancing and rock music brought him to a nightclub on the beach every night after work. He paid for his drinks and entry with small pieces of cheese called caciotta. After all, he had plenty of cheese, even when money was tight. He soon became affectionately known as Il Pastorello, or the Shepherd Boy. It was a fair trade – the small cheeses went like hot cakes and brought him more recognition.

When Giovanni met Renato Zero, who was one of Italy's best-known singers at the time, the cheese's popularity grew even more. Renato was impressed by the quality of the cheese, and became a vocal supporter of Cannas dairy. That was when the family's business really took off. “I threw myself into absorbing all my family's experience and knowledge about sheep's cheese,” says Giovanni. “My father taught me how to measure the ingredients into the sheep's milk and how to calculate the time the cheese needed to ripen, as well as the differences between the ways Pecorino is produced in Sardinia and in Tuscany.”

He leads us into the cheese dairy where the sheep's milk is turned into pecorino. It is the beating heart of Fattoria Lischeto. Traditionally pecorino is made from pure sheep's milk. However, this is often very expensive. Sheep produce at most a litre and a half of milk per day, and thirteen litres is required to make a kilo of hard cheese. Some mix in cheaper cow's milk. To Giovanni, this is unthinkable. “We use only the unpasteurised milk produced by our sheep,” he declares proudly. “What's more, no artificial fertilisers are used, and nothing is done to hasten the ripening process. From the feed through to the finished cheese, everything is organic.”

Another thing that benefits the production of the sheep's milk is that his flock of 800 sheep have plenty of space to roam. The meadows are enormous for a flock of this size. On top of that, dedication to the work makes a difference. The farmer says, “You have to treat the sheep with love and respect. Only then will they repay you with plenty of high-quality milk.”

The sheep's milk is coagulated in enormous troughs using rennet. The curds are cut using a tool called a cheese harp, which separates the whey. The most important factor in the quality of the cheese, after the milk production and coagulation processes, is the environmental conditions during the ripening stage. Fattoria Lischeto's cheese storehouse lies alongside the dairy. Giovanni is meticulous about maintaining a temperature of 11 degrees Celsius with a humidity of 92 percent. It's a real treasure trove. There are between 600 and 800 wheels stored here at any given time, each worth an average of €60.

As we enter the storehouse, there is a cool waft of air that smells of sheep and pecorino. It feels like entering a walk-in refrigerator. In one room, the wheels are carefully wiped down with salt water, brushed, rubbed with olive oil, turned, and stored on wooden shelves. “That all influences the flavour and consistency,” says Giovanni.

Giovanni takes a wheel of cheese from the shelf, gently strokes a hand over the rind, and turns it. He sniffs the cheese and taps his fingers on it, determining its ripeness from the sound it makes. “The sound and scent together are the best way of telling whether the pecorino has been aged for long enough,” he explains.

The rind is coated with ash to prevent mould from developing. It is this that gives the cheese its dark outer layer. The cheese he holds is a Balze Volterrane, made from raw milk and wild artichoke rennet. It is aged for twelve months and holds pride of place among the ten variants of pecorino produced at Fattoria Lischeto. It's a real classic.

The Balze Volterrane gathered huge amounts of interest and praise at the BIOFACH Nuremberg trade fair in 1992. After the Balze Volterrane pecorino won an award, Fattoria Lischeto could barely keep up with demand. Today, the family business exports its pecorino to Germany, France, Poland, Taiwan, and the USA. Its cheeses are for sale at Harrods in London, Paris, and Shanghai. The Fattoria Lischeto estate includes a hotel with twenty rooms and a farm shop that sells the family's own cheese products and olive oil, pasta, honey, and cosmetics made by other organic producers from the region.

Giovanni remains a little sceptical of the commotion made about his cheeses. He's still just a shepherd at heart – one with a great affection for women. His three marriages, many friendships and the art that has resulted from them are a testament to his colourful life.

On one occasion, Giovanni gifted a Dutch artist a meadow with a stunning view to demonstrate the strength of his feelings for her. As thanks, she created a bronze sculpture for him, an abstract figure of a woman lying on her back and balancing a globe on her feet, which are raised skyward. The sculpture was awarded a significant cash prize at a contemporary art fair, and Giovanni had a twelve-metre stone copy made and installed at Fattoria Lischeto. The reclining woman has since become a landmark throughout the region. It is the symbol that identifies pecorino made by Giovanni Cannas – exceptional organic hard cheeses from Tuscany.