227 Hectares
The entirely organic Monte Sante Marie estate extends over 227 hectares of rolling hills and part of the Ombrone river plain, mainly devoted to cereals — both heritage and conventional grains — and forage crops, as well as woodland and pasture.
The estate also includes 8 hectares of olive groves and 1.5 hectares of protected natural truffle grounds.
These are the source of the estate’s flagship products: artisan pasta and beer made from heritage grains, stone-ground flours, an extra virgin olive oil with exceptional sensory qualities, and the prized white truffle of the Crete Senesi.
HERITAGE GRAINS
Our heritage grains are the result of a long process of recovering and preserving the estate’s own seeds. For many years we were custodian farmers, safeguarding traditional varieties. Rather than buying seed, we propagate our own.
We chose to grow heritage grains for two reasons:
- The historical archives of the Monte Sante Marie estate reveal that Verna was once grown here — an old Tuscan wheat variety particularly well suited to breadmaking. When we later decided to produce pasta, we added an old durum wheat variety, ideal for making high-quality semolina.
- Heritage grains are naturally suited to organic farming: they adapt to the land in which they grow rather than — as with industrial wheat — requiring the land to be adapted to their needs. This means there is no need for intensive use of fertilisers; their tall stems help suppress weeds without herbicides, while their hardy ears allow us to avoid pesticides. Growing these grains is therefore entirely consistent with our approach to farming: organic and respectful of the environment in which we work, while offering an alternative to industrial agriculture and the multinational model behind it.
8 HECTARES OF OLIVE GROVES
Until 2012 we were certified organic. Then we went one step further and freed ourselves from the paperwork too. In 2019 we officially became organic again — somewhat unnecessarily, since we had never used chemicals on our trees — but we thought we might as well make it official.
Our olive groves lie at around 300 metres above sea level and are planted with traditional Tuscan varieties. For more than thirty years they have been nourished solely with green manure, animal manure and rainwater: organic in name and in practice, and rather greener than any certification could ever convey.
1.5 HECTARES OF NATURAL TRUFFLE GROUNDS
Across the estate are unspoilt valleys and waterways where the most precious and mysterious of the earth’s treasures has always grown: the elusive white truffle.
It is a product that is not really a product at all: it is not cultivated, but gathered. The most we can do is maintain the land in the ideal conditions for Tuber magnatum Pico to thrive. It is extraordinarily capricious and highly sensitive to anything that disturbs the natural balance of the soil.
Since 2001, the richest truffle-producing areas of the Monte Sante Marie estate — in a magnificent poplar grove along the Ombrone river — have been officially recognised as managed natural truffle grounds: areas where harvesting is reserved for us, in return for our responsibility to care for and improve them through continuous soil maintenance, water management and the planting of suitable tree species.
BEEHIVES AND HONEY
Beehives are scattered across the estate, producing small quantities of excellent natural honey.
Our next frontier? Bringing into production a handful of extraordinarily rare grape varieties — some once thought to be extinct — that miraculously survived decades of abandonment and were rediscovered by chance in the estate’s gardens and woodland in 2017.
How they came to be here remains a mystery, and one we are still investigating.
The first harvest is coming soon.
