Known in Europe for just over a century, the Peruvian pepper plant arrived in Carmagnola at the beginning of the twentieth century, introduced by the far-sighted horticulturist Domenico Ferrero. Today the Carmagnola pepper, with its bright red or intense yellow colour, is now known and appreciated throughout Piedmont for its unique characteristics of quality and authenticity. There are four different types of pepper: the Quadrato (almost a cube, with four points), the Corno or Lungo (a very elongated cone), the Spinner (heart-shaped), the Tomaticot (a rounded variety flattened at the poles like a pomodoro, tomatic or pomatic in subalpine dialects). The object of the Slow Food Presidium is Lungo, which has always been called Corno di Bue in the Carmagnola area. A pepper with splendid colors (intense yellow or bright red) and a very elongated conical shape (over 20 centimeters) with three or four lobes (on the model of the primordial Spagnolìn, the oblong pepper from the Americas). The Corno di Bue pepper was not at risk of extinction, but was degraded by the habit of using it – often mixed with anonymous imported varieties – for the canning industry.

The Slow Food Presidium was created to create a new market for this vegetable with excellent organoleptic characteristics: appetizing table vegetable or noble ingredient of traditional and creative recipes.