Caseificio Il Fiorino is a family dairy, with a history dating back to 1957, based in the medieval village of Roccalbegna, on the slopes of Monte Amiata, in Italy. The dairy itself was built in 1989 on an estate belonging to the family. For centuries, the local area was inhospitable, plagued by malaria and run by bandits, but in the mid nineteenth century, Leopold II of Loraine began restoring it and a lush and inviting province was created. The dairy is now set in the most gorgeous landscape, with abundant pastures all around, the Maremma hills and mountains on one side and the coast on the other.
All the milk used to make the cheeses is sourced from local Maremma flocks, all hand selected for their high quality milk and all based within 40km of the dairy. Even the wooden boards on which the cheese are aged and hand selected for quality. Caseificio Il Fiorino is the most awarded Pecorino dairy in the world.
In 2012, the dairy installed a photovoltaic system, which now generates around 35% of the energy they use and saves tens of thousands of euros each year.
In 2020, the business used 89% of the kWh they produced, which meant that they reduced withdrawal from the National Grid by 29%, saved 86.4 tonnes of Co2 from entering the atmosphere, equivalent to 29.4 tonnes of oil or the reforesting 15.6 hectares of land.