El Brite de Larieto

El Brite de Larieto is the working-farm dining project of the Gaspari family — Riccardo Gaspari's parents, Flavio and Giovanna, run the farm; Riccardo himself runs the Michelin-starred SanBrite a kilometre below — and the most authentic farm-to-table experience in the Dolomites. The restaurant is built into a stone-and-larch malga in a high-pasture larch forest at 1,750 metres above the village; the cattle, sheep, pigs and goats grazing outside are the same animals that arrive on the menu.

The cooking is intentionally simpler than SanBrite's — this is the working-farm side of the operation. Hand-rolled casunziei (the Ladin beetroot-filled ravioli that is the regional canonical pasta); slow-cooked spezzatino with polenta and the farm's own Valdacosta cheese; grilled Ladin-cattle steaks; a wood-fired pizza menu that uses the farm's own milk for the mozzarella; the famous 'panna cotta dei Gaspari' that uses the malga's own cow's milk and is the headline dessert.

The wine list is deliberately short and built around Ladin-region small growers — Alto Adige, Trentino, Friuli — with glass pours starting at €6. The cellar holds a tightly chosen Vezzena and Asiago cheese vertical that is the kitchen's signature pairing programme. Service is family-direct: Flavio runs the dining room, Giovanna runs the kitchen pass, and the captains rotate from the Gaspari extended family.

The room is the most photogenic in Cortina — stone walls, hand-carved larch ceiling, hand-painted Ladin-folk-art panels, a wood-burning stove in the centre, and outdoor seating on a south-facing terrace with a 270-degree larch-forest view. The lunch experience is the canonical one — most Cortina locals lunch here on weekends. Dinner runs less frequently and the access (the road is narrow and serpentine) means most diners walk up from the village in winter.

El Brite de Larieto is the team-dinner room of choice for a Cortina trip — the format is shared-plate Ladin family cooking, the malga setting is the conversation, and the volume on a Saturday lunch is celebratory. It is also the most reliable first-date answer in the village if both diners want Dolomites atmosphere without the seven-course pacing of a tasting menu. Book the long table on the south terrace for a group of six.