The environment.

Ever since medieval times, the Municipality of Mugnano del Cardinale, situated between the provinces of Naples and Avellino at the foot of the Partenio Massif, has been renowned for the production of salumi, or cured pork products. As a result of the handing down of the traditional working techniques and the particular tastiness and quality of the meats, today it is considered the cradle of the national production of local salumi.

Here the climate and the vegetation are typical of the plains of southern Italy: light breezes that blow from south to west, and forests and woods of beech, oak and chestnut trees, create an ideal micro-climate for the perfect and fragrant maturing of the salumi. The bounty of nature is then married to age-old techniques and knowledge: in Mugnano del Cardinale, and the surrounding area, they were already raising pigs and producing salumi in the year 1400. In 1775, thanks to the construction of the Via Regia delle Puglie, Mugnano del Cardinale became a trading centre for commerce between Naples and Puglia, stimulating the development and the spread of Neapolitan Salami and Salami of Mugnano del Cardinale and of other typical products that thereafter became famous in Italy and throughout the world.

The excellence of these products is due to the quality of the meats used; they have always used the best parts of the pigs: lean meat, rich in unsaturated fatty acids, the so-called good fats, and in lecithin, a substance that combats cholesterol. Then, as now, salumi were considered a prized gift.