Senatore Cappelli wheat: superfood for excellent pasta and more

Certainly, this austere elderly marquis with his fine top hat would never have expected to carry the name of a grain that is used to make excellent pasta. Raffaele Cappelli, an Abruzzese senator during the XIV legislature of the Kingdom of Italy from 1919 to 1921 and a parliamentary member in several previous legislatures, always distinguished himself for his desire to help the South grow, to develop and progress its lands of origin. For this reason, he financed the projects of a geneticist, a true revolutionary for those times: Nazareno Strampelli.

The aim was to create a wheat hybrid that could resist diseases and offer a greater yield from a nutritional standpoint. At the Research Center for Cereal Cultivation in Foggia, after various attempts since the late 1800s, Strampelli succeeded in isolating a strain of wheat with the desired characteristics in 1915. He patented it and dedicated it to the Senator who believed in him so much.

This is how the Senatore Cappelli Durum Wheat was born, which today is taking over the most discerning Italian and international tables. Why discerning? Because it is a product that can be defined as a “superfood” or functional thanks to its uniquely distinct composition. Its land is the South: Puglia, Basilicata, Calabria, Sicily, Campania.

Bernardo Pasquali

S&M