"Our tour visited the Ciaolatte farm/Parmigiano-Reggiano manufacturer near Parma on my wife 's birthday. First, a young man gave us a guided tour of the cheese-making facility. For the tour, we wore blue booties over our shoes. The tour ended in a giant room containing cheese wheels stacked to the ceiling. My wife recorded that there were 7,000 wheels in the cooled storage room/warehouse. After this, we went back outside to get samples of three different versions of the cheese, each aged a different length of time. An early dinner followed the cheese tasting. It was prepared by the owner and female employees of Ciaolatte. There were such things as penne pasta with tomato sauce, risotto with cheese sauce, several veggies, some fruit, and bread. As you would expect, there was lots of grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. The piece de resistance was a decorated torte prepared by the mother of the man who gave the tour. This was my wife 's birthday cake, ricotto torte, complete with a flaming candle. There was also home-made vanilla gelato to go on the torte. In addition, my wife received a large birthday card signed by the people on our tour and gifts from the tour director. After we finished eating, we went back to see the girls, the pampered cows who provide the milk for the cheese. All in all, this was perhaps my wife 's best birthday ever."
