It all started in Acerno (SA) in the second half of the eighteenth century, when Villecco grandfather Agostino, having heard about the excess of sheep milk on the island, decided to visit Sardinia. After verifying the truth of this assertion, Agostino made periodical trips to Sardinia: arriving with his family in December, when sheep have just lambed and started milking, and returning to Acerno in the spring, as the raw materials ran out.
Agostino Villecco was among the first to produce in Sardinia and to age in the Appennini Lucani. Later many other producers from Southern Italy came to Sardinia to make cheese intended for the export markets. At the time, Sardinia was used only for the production process, and was left out from the commercial side of the cheese market, since the cheesemakers from Tuscany, Lazio, Campania, and Greece made cheese exclusively to meet the tastes of their areas of origin. This was the way the Villeccos started too: in those times they produced the Moliterno, the Toscanello, The Pecorino Romano, and the ricottas.
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