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Barreling down an Italian country road in a taxi, zipping past everything from grassy farms to modest homes and deteriorating long-ago ruins, I’m on the way from the bustling community of Parma to the vibrant, yet decidedly quieter, town of Busseto. My destination is someone’s house; from what I’ve heard it’s a sprawling property that I was informed I just had to check out. Unfortunately, the ornate Villa’s owner won’t be there to greet me. He died over 100 years ago.
Parma perhaps doesn’t even crack the top 10 of places in Italy where would-be visitors dream of traversing to. After all, there’s the eternal city of Rome, the urban center of Milan and pizza-centric Naples, not to mention the picturesque Amalfi coast or idyllic Capri, Como’s glistening waters, as well as Puglia, Bologna, Florence, Venice, Sicily or any number of other communities where tour buses roll, couples go on their honeymoons and influencers flock to post Instagram-selfies with captions that say “La Dolce Vida” (and yes, I saw someone do this). If anything, the only thing the name Parma invokes in most people’s minds is cheese.
To put it simply, Parma is the Wisconsin of Italian life, at least in the sense that cheese culture reigns supreme here. As one may have guessed, Parma is the proud home of Parmesan Reggiano. (The Reggiano portion of that moniker comes from the name of this region.)