The city is full of history, culture and food and wine excellences, to the point that Pollenzo, its most famous hamlet, is the seat of the Università di Scienze Gastronomiche to whom go students coming from all over the world. Moreover the tower, which arises in the middle of the village square, hosts the Banca del Vino (Wine Bank), where are conserved and aged some of the most famous Italian cru.
Bra is the ideal place for all those who want to enjoy food and wine tour, starting just from the most famous local product, the Bra sausage, which is sold in the ten butcheries of the consortium: Aprato, Giovanni Beltramo, Bruno Carena, Adriano Fissore, Flavio Fissore, Da Masino, Milanesio, Domenico Scaglia, Bernardo Tibaldi, Davide Tibaldi. Each butchery hands down its own recipe made of fassona bovine meat, pork fat, spices and sometimes wine and cheese.
Another typical product, which takes its name from the city, is the Bra cheese in the two versions Hard and Soft Bra PDO. You can taste and buy these and many others cheeses at Giolito’s: a shop specialised in the selection and in the seasoning of the best local products from the plain to the pasture. Here, on request, you can enjoy a tasting experience: a trip though the shop, the laboratory the seasoning cells and finally the place where cheese are seasoned, where there is a small museum dedicated to the dairy. Thanks to the International Fair Cheese, Giolito has become increasingly famous also among the foreign customers.
Cheese is a fair, held biyearly, which transforms the entire city in an international shop window for raw milk cheeses and dairy products. This year, from 20th to 23rd September will take place the XII edition of the event, organised by Slow Food and the City of Bra. The theme of 2019 will be “Naturale è possibile” (Natural is possible), to show that cheese without synthetic ferments are richer of biodiversity and more authentic and respectful of the territory. This theme will include also cured meat, bread and wines.
If you go for a walk in the city center, you cannot miss Converso, one of the most famous and historical bar of Bra, characterised by a handcrafted production. This is a coffee bar, but also a confectionery and ice-cream shop and it has been included in the list of the “Locali Storici d’Italia”, because, as you can notice immediately entering in, the furniture is made of vintage wood with boiseries and Art Decò decorations. Converso is considered a real temple of taste and its fame has been confirmed during the years thanks to the quality of the products: from the breakfast to the appetizer.. from the take-away confectionery to the cake design, from catering to the coffee bar. This shops is characterised by the freshness and the genuineness of its creations inspired to the history and the tradition of the Bra confectionery. In the laboratory, located near the coffee bar, you can find brioches, biscuits, mono-portion cakes, panettoni and Easter eggs. In summer a dehors is located in Via Cavour the main road of the historical centre.
The coffee lovers must absolutely visit La Bottega delle delizie, founded in 1982 as a shop specialised in chocolate, honey, coffee and candies….Today there is also a coffee corner where you can taste the specialty coffees. Moreover here you can buy homemade beers, natural wines, sweets, chocolate, rhum or hazelnut pralines, nougat, cherry and Curaçao cream.
Among the restaurants and the historical places we have to mention the osteria Boccondivino (located in the courtyard of Slow Food seat), the Battaglino Restaurant (since 1919) and the Antico Caffé Boglione, the week-end meeting point of the inhabitants.