Star treatment at an Italian dairy farm

A queue forms for massages as jazz piano blares from the speakers: one of the world’s best buffalo mozzarellas begins with VIP treatment in the stable. Ducky, Sweety and Lady shuffle toward the sound system, lured by Keith Jarrett’s creamy licks at the exclusive Tenuta Vannulo dairy in southern Italy. “The music helps them produce more milk because the animal feels more relaxed,” says Valentina Michelucci, a 25-year-old groom with tousled hair, who says she also wants to try some disco hits. “They’re very curious when they hear it.” The half-ton black water buffalo spend their days lounging on rubber mattresses, munching on organic hay or eagerly awaiting the spray showers that form a fine, refreshing mist from overhead hoses. When they feel the need, they head to a special pen for automatic milking by a unique machine that knows the exact shape of each udder thanks to a code emitted by the electronic collars worn by the buffaloes. “You have to treat the animals well to produce milk without stress,” Antonio Palmieri, owner of the 200-hectare farm, tells AFP. Wearing a Panama hat, a collarless linen shirt and loafers, this dapper man, considered a pioneer in environmentally friendly buffalo farming, sits in a well-kept garden next to his three stables, which house 500 buffaloes. The farm sells about 300 kilos of mozzarella a day for 13 euros per kilo. But you have to go to the farm, 50 km south of Salerno, to buy it. Palmieri does not deal with distribution or marketing. Business is booming, thanks to word of mouth and the dairy’s international reputation among buffalo milk lovers. In August alone, 45,000 customers visited the farm shop. During a recent AFP visit, dozens of cars were parked in the parking lot and a group of German tourists were touring the farm. Business has boomed despite Italy’s economic crisis. “You can really taste the buffalo milk. It’s a bit far, but it’s worth it!” exclaims Anna Orzano, a customer from Salerno, with her bag of ricotta and mozzarella in hand. The base remains mozzarella, but Vannulo also makes a range of buffalo milk products, including yogurt, ice cream and, starting next year, chocolate. “Animal welfare is an important issue,” said cheese expert Piero Sardo, while admitting that the link between better treatment and tastier milk was scientifically “difficult to prove.” The history of buffalo milk production in Italy dates back to the 12th century, but it remained largely a local affair until relatively recently because of the difficulties of refrigerating milk. Before the 1980s, most of the region’s dairies were small producers like Vannulo. But in recent years, buffalo mozzarella has gone global and is now a favourite in top restaurants from Dubai to Moscow to Sydney. The highly sought-after cheese sells for 30 euros per kilo in Russia. The expansion of production has also brought problems, including massive imports of buffalo milk from central and eastern Europe and the use of frozen or powdered milk. But Domenico Raimondo, president of the Italian Buffalo Mozzarella Consortium, which is trying to impose strict regulations on the sector, says a return to the local market like Vannulo’s would be “uneconomic.” From Vannulo’s stables, the porcelain-white milk is poured into large vats to curdle. Its high water content is filtered before a team of three workers begins to transform it into mozzarella. “Milk is not simple, it’s a living thing,” says Donato Brinca, 46, a head cheesemaker, as he mixes the milk into a dough and kneads it into mozzarella. “A good mozzarella should have a sweet taste and a hint of nuttiness,” he says. The result is a tough sell for the diet-conscious. Fresh buffalo milk contains about 8.0 percent fat, more than twice as much as cow’s milk. Palmieri, whose family has raised cattle for generations, acknowledges: “Buffalo mozzarella is certainly tastier, but it’s not really healthy.”