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Polenta concia, bagna cauda, Menabrea beer, tajarin pasta, and the best restaurants in the Biellese territory
Biella's food culture is mountain food — hearty, honest, and deeply connected to the land. Sitting at the foot of the Biellese Alps, the province straddles two culinary worlds: the rich dairy and grain traditions of the uplands, and the rice-growing lowlands of the Vercelli plain to the south. The result is a cuisine that combines alpine comfort food with the sophisticated Piedmontese tradition that many food writers consider the finest in all of Italy.
Unlike the tourist-oriented restaurants of more famous Italian food destinations, Biella's trattorias and osterias serve locals first. Menus change with the seasons — wild herbs and fresh cheeses in spring, grilled meats and salads in summer, truffles and game in autumn, polenta and slow-cooked stews in winter. Portions are generous, prices are honest, and the wine list will almost certainly include obscure local bottles that never make it beyond the province. This is eating as the Piedmontese do it: serious about quality, unpretentious about presentation, and always accompanied by good conversation and plenty of wine.
If Biella has one signature dish, this is it. Polenta concia takes coarse-ground cornmeal — cooked slowly for at least 40 minutes in a copper pot (paiolo), stirred constantly with a wooden stick — and layers it with generous amounts of local toma cheese and butter. The whole thing is then baked until the top forms a golden, bubbling crust. The result is devastating in its simplicity: creamy, rich, deeply savoury, and utterly comforting. Every family in the Biellese has their own recipe, debated with the passion that other regions reserve for ragù. In traditional mountain trattorias, polenta concia is served on a wooden board in the centre of the table, and diners simply cut off pieces as they eat.
No Piedmontese food guide is complete without bagna cauda — literally "hot bath." This is Piedmont's most famous communal dish: a warm dip of olive oil, butter, garlic, and salt-cured anchovies, kept bubbling in individual terracotta pots (fujot) over small candles. Diners dunk an astonishing array of raw and cooked vegetables — cardoons (the traditional star), peppers, beetroot, cabbage, cauliflower, Jerusalem artichokes — into the fragrant, intensely savoury sauce. Bagna cauda is traditionally a late autumn and winter dish, served at long communal tables with plenty of robust red wine. In Biella, the annual Bagna Cauda Day, celebrated across Piedmont in late November, is taken very seriously indeed.
Tajarin are Piedmont's answer to tagliatelle — thin, golden egg pasta ribbons made with an extravagant number of egg yolks (up to 30 per kilogram of flour in some traditional recipes), giving them a rich colour and silky texture that's unmistakable. In the Biellese, tajarin are most commonly served with a simple butter and sage sauce, with a slow-cooked meat ragù, or — in autumn — shaved with white truffle. The best tajarin are still handmade, rolled thin and cut with a knife rather than a machine, and they cook in barely two minutes.
The Vercelli plain just south of Biella is the rice bowl of Europe, producing the finest Carnaroli and Arborio rice in the world. Unsurprisingly, risotto is a staple of Biellese menus. The local versions tend towards simplicity: risotto al Castelmagno (with the pungent blue-veined cheese from the nearby Cuneo province), risotto con la salsiccia (with crumbled sausage), or in autumn, risotto al tartufo bianco (with shaved white truffle). The rice is always cooked all'onda — with a wave-like consistency, neither too dry nor too soupy, each grain distinct but bound in a creamy, starchy embrace.
Toma is the everyday cheese of the Biellese Alps — a semi-soft, cow's milk cheese that ranges from mild and milky when young to intensely nutty and slightly crumbly when aged. Each mountain dairy (alpeggio) produces its own toma, and the differences between them are a source of fierce local pride. Toma piemontese DOP is the protected designation, but the best examples come from small producers in the valleys above Biella who still make cheese by hand from the milk of cows grazing on alpine pastures. Eat it with honey and walnuts as a dessert, melted into polenta concia, or simply sliced with good bread and a glass of red wine.
The Biellese tradition of cured meats reflects both mountain and lowland influences. Salame della duja is the most distinctive — a soft, spreadable salami preserved in rendered pork fat (strutto) inside a terracotta jar (duja), a preservation method that dates back centuries and gives the salami a uniquely creamy texture. Lardo (cured pork back fat) from the mountain farms, mocetta (dried goat or beef similar to bresaola), and fidighìna (a liver sausage) round out the traditional salumi board.
Biella holds a remarkable distinction in Italian food history: it is home to Birra Menabrea, Italy's oldest continuously operating brewery, founded in 1846. While Italy is not traditionally associated with beer culture, the Biellese Alps have always provided the perfect conditions for brewing — cool temperatures, pure mountain water, and a Germanic influence that filtered down from the valleys to the north.
The Menabrea brewery sits in the heart of Biella, its historic stone buildings a landmark in the city. The brewery was founded by Giuseppe Menabrea, who began producing beer in vaulted cellars that maintained a constant cool temperature year-round. Today, Menabrea produces a range of lagers and ales, but the flagship Menabrea Bionda — a clean, crisp, golden lager — remains the most popular. It's served in virtually every bar and restaurant in Biella, and locals are fiercely loyal to it.
The brewery offers guided tours that take visitors through the original 19th-century cellars, the modern brewing halls, and a small museum documenting the history of beer production in the area. Tours conclude with a tasting session in the brewery's atmospheric hall. Booking in advance is recommended, particularly during summer and weekends. For beer enthusiasts, the brewery also produces limited-edition and seasonal beers that are often only available on-site or in select Biella establishments.
The Biellese wine country is one of Piedmont's best-kept secrets. While the world focuses on Barolo, Barbaresco, and the Langhe, the vineyards north of Biella quietly produce some of Italy's most characterful and terroir-driven wines at a fraction of the price.
Erbaluce di Caluso DOCG: The star local white, made from the ancient Erbaluce grape grown on the morainic hills south of Biella and around Caluso. In its still version, Erbaluce is crisp, mineral, and refreshing — perfect with fish, salads, and lighter Piedmontese dishes. The spumante (sparkling) version, made by the traditional method, rivals many Franciacortas. And the passito (dessert wine), made from grapes dried on racks for months, is a lusciously sweet, amber-gold wine that pairs beautifully with aged cheeses and hazelnut desserts.
Lessona DOC and Bramaterra DOC: These small, little-known appellations north of Biella produce elegant red wines from Nebbiolo (locally called Spanna), often blended with small percentages of Vespolina and Croatina. Lessona in particular, with its iron-rich soils, produces Nebbiolo of remarkable finesse — lighter and more floral than Barolo, but with a silky depth that rewards patient cellaring. These are wines that serious Italian wine lovers seek out precisely because they remain under the radar and honestly priced.
Set in the hills above Biella with views over the city and the plain beyond, Il Faggio is one of the area's most refined dining experiences. The kitchen takes traditional Biellese and Piedmontese recipes and elevates them with careful technique and seasonal ingredients — expect dishes like tajarin with slow-braised veal, toma cheese soufflé, and beautifully composed desserts featuring hazelnuts, chocolate, and local honey. The wine list is a love letter to Piedmont, with particular depth in the northern Piedmont appellations (Lessona, Bramaterra, Gattinara) that rarely appear outside the region. Reserve ahead, especially for weekend dinners and the terrace in summer.
Tucked away in the medieval lanes of Biella Piazzo, the Taverna dell'Elfo occupies a vaulted stone cellar that feels unchanged since the Renaissance. The menu is firmly rooted in Biellese tradition — polenta concia, bagna cauda in season, hand-rolled tajarin, and a rotating selection of local cheeses and salumi. What elevates this place above the ordinary is the warmth of the welcome, the quality of the ingredients (many sourced from small producers within 30 km), and a wine cellar that's clearly been curated by someone who drinks well. It's the kind of restaurant where you come for dinner and leave three hours later, slightly wine-flushed, having made friends with the table next to you.
Osteria La Piola represents the best of the modern Piedmontese osteria tradition — informal, convivial, and focused on simple food done exceptionally well. The daily menu is handwritten on a blackboard and changes with what's fresh: stuffed peppers in summer, pumpkin risotto in autumn, bollito misto (mixed boiled meats with green sauce) in winter. The house wine is local, honest, and served in tumblers. Prices are remarkably fair, and the atmosphere — a mix of local workers, families, and the occasional textile executive in a cashmere blazer — captures the democratic spirit of Biellese dining.
A stalwart of the Biella dining scene for decades, Trattoria Cervo serves no-nonsense Piedmontese cooking in generous portions at honest prices. The fritto misto alla piemontese — a bewildering assortment of fried sweet and savoury morsels including veal, organ meats, semolina, apple, and amaretti biscuits — is the dish that brings people back again and again. Also excellent are the agnolotti del plin (tiny pinched pasta parcels filled with roasted meat) and the brasato al Barolo (beef braised in Barolo wine until meltingly tender). The wine list focuses on Piedmont with some excellent Gattinara and Lessona options that pair perfectly with the robust food.
Saturday market in Biella Piano: The weekly market fills the streets around Piazza Vittorio Veneto every Saturday morning with stalls selling local cheeses (look for toma, Castelmagno, and Gorgonzola from nearby Novara), cured meats, seasonal vegetables, fresh pasta, bread, and honey from the mountain valleys. It's the best place to assemble a picnic before heading up to Oasi Zegna or Oropa.
Enoteca and cheese shops: The Piazzo quarter has several excellent small shops specialising in local wines and cheeses. Ask for Lessona wines — they're almost impossible to find outside the province and represent extraordinary value. For cheese, request toma d'alpeggio (mountain pasture toma) made during the summer months when the cows graze on alpine wildflowers — the difference in flavour from lowland toma is remarkable.
Seasonal specialities to look for: White truffles (October–December), chestnuts (October–November), fresh walnuts (October), wild mushrooms — particularly porcini — from the forests above Oropa (September–October), and fresh Erbaluce grapes for eating (September).
Polenta concia is Biella's most iconic dish — coarse-ground polenta enriched with generous amounts of melted local toma cheese and butter, baked until golden and crusty on top. It's a mountain comfort food that reflects the area's alpine heritage and dairy farming traditions. Bagna cauda, the warm anchovy-garlic dip served with raw and cooked vegetables, is another Piedmontese classic you'll find on virtually every local menu.
Yes. Birra Menabrea, Italy's oldest active brewery founded in 1846, is located in central Biella and offers guided tours of the historic brewery, including the original cellars, the brewing halls, and the small museum tracing the history of beer production in the area. Tours typically conclude with a tasting session. Booking in advance is recommended, particularly during summer months and weekends.
The most distinctive local wine is Erbaluce di Caluso DOCG, a crisp white wine made from the Erbaluce grape grown in vineyards south of Biella. For reds, look for Lessona DOC and Bramaterra DOC — both made primarily from Nebbiolo grapes (locally called Spanna) and offering excellent, often overlooked alternatives to the more famous Barolo and Barbaresco from further south in Piedmont.