Appennino Tosco-Emiliano National Park

Palazzo Ducale Piazza Napoleone, 32 55100 Lucca ( LU)

The National Park of the Tuscan - Emilian Apennines (Italian Parco Nazionale Apennine Tosco - Emiliano ) was established on 21 May 2001.

It is located in the provinces of Lucca, Massa Carrara, Parma and Reggio Emilia and includes the communes of Busana, Castelnovo ne ' Monti, Collagna, Comano, Corniglio, Filattiera, Fivizzano, Giuncugnano, Licciana Nardi, Ligonchio, Ramiseto, San Romano in Garfagnana, Villa Collemandina and Villa Minozzo.

The Park

70 percent of its total area located in the Emilia -Romagna region, the rest of Tuscany. In the National Park of the Tuscan - Emilian Apennines several former regional parks were combined, and that the Parco Regionale del Gigante, parts of the Parco Regionale dell'Alta Val Parma e Cedra in the Emilia-Romagna and the landscapes of the Lunigiana and Garfagnana Tuscany on the page, designating the most beautiful peaks of the northern Apennines ridge. Rich in forests, except the beech woods individual plants of pine trees and other conifers are to be mentioned.

The National Park Authority is in Sassalbo di Fivizzano.

Gastronomy

Through historical and millennial route is longer ( the Bergjoche delle Radici, di Pradarena, del Cerreto, del Lagastrello ) and rich in traditional designs ( bakeries, metati, coal mines, mills, old rural mountain homes ), the park two apparently contradictory elements, people and the environment, reconcile. As everywhere in the Apennines, the human habitation for hundreds of years based on the exploitation of forest resources (wood, mountain cereals, chestnuts, mushrooms, blueberries ) and the cheese fermentation. The typical local cheese is Parmigiano -Reggiano ( Parmesan cheese suitable for grating ), the most delicious variety of red cows ), but also a striking production of Schafskäsen, which is common in many small dairies and sold after a short maturation will.

The simplest bakery product is the " round bread " ( pane Rotondo ) from Civago, a small town near Villa Minozzo, starting point for park walks through the woods from Abetina real and on the Tuscan side, the bread of Signano, another small town near Fivizzano which is slightly salted, a feature of many Tuscan bread types. Cheese and sausages accompany other types of bread prepared with lard, as the many salt biscuits gnòcc in the Emilian, chèzi and stri hot. The polenta ( maize porridge ) are cooked, spread on the table and barely seasoned; the cazagai ( ie polenta mixed with soffritto, a traditional Italian sauce made with onions, herbs and bacon ): polenta fumante ( still hot polenta ), usually served with ricotta, cheese and sausage, was the main course of rural families in the northern Apennines. Recently, a protection for the erbazzone was required, one in the whole Emilia -Romagna spread with spinach or chard, onion, lard and parmesan filled salt cake, which is embedded in a thin dough and then baked.