FEATURE - Slow down and enjoy, say Italy's good food militants
Date: 05-Nov-02
Country: ITALY
Author: Estelle Shirbon
There, five cooks in starched white aprons and hats are preparing "gattafin", small parcels of fresh pasta filled with a mixture of wild herbs, picked that very morning from woodlands and fields.
In a corner of the courtyard shaded by a church, three sommeliers in formal suits, the silver chains of their profession around their necks, are ready with a selection of fine wines.
This is the second of five stops in an afternoon-long gastronomical walk around Orvieto, a small town perched on a spit of rock in the midst of a lush Umbrian valley.
And though you would never guess from the peaceful surroundings, it is also one of the most active fronts in the war against corporate-led globalisation.
Carla Guarnieri, from a nearby town, is among the people who trickle into the courtyard, pausing to take in the sweeping view and breathe in the gentle aromas before tucking in.
"This is bliss," she says, in between mouthfuls.
"What could be better than to take a long walk around the most interesting sights in a beautiful town, tasting delicious dishes and drinking good wine as you go?"
That's music to the ears of the Slow Food movement, which is behind the Orvieto gathering. But for them it also about more than merely pleasing the palate.
Slow Food aims to revolutionise the way we eat.
ENDANGERED FOODS
The movement began in Italy in 1986, in response to the opening of a McDonald's fast food restaurant on Rome's heritage-steeped Piazza di Spagna.
Since then, it has grown into a worldwide "eco-gastronomical" organisation boasting some 80,000 members.
"We're not interested in talking only to privileged gourmets," said Giacomo Mojoli, who heads its international arm.
"Quality food cannot exist without respect for the environment, for species of animals and plants, for the workers who produce the food and the consumers who eat it. Slow Food is about much more than food itself."
The movement demonstrated that it could make a significant impact two years ago when the European Union brought in new food hygiene standards in response to food safety scares that had swept the continent throughout the 1990s.
Slow Food argued that the standards, first developed in the 1960s to make food safe for astronauts, made sense for industrial food plants but would put numerous small-scale producers who couldn't afford the equipment out of business.
It argued the case so convincingly that the EU granted hundreds of exemptions to small producers.
VIRTUOUS GLOBALISATION
Slow Food sees globalisation as a problem when it means homogenous cultures around the world, but also regards it as a force for good that allows niche producers to find markets.
"We believe there is a virtuous globalisation that we can use to our advantage," said Mojoli.
"We don't need to attack a McDonald's to get our message across, we can use the Internet and the media to much greater effect."
Slow Food in 1995 launched a symbolic "Ark of Taste" designed to find viable markets for what the movement calls "endangered species of food".
For example, types of grain that are seldom cultivated because they have lower yields than commonly used varieties, or breeds of livestock whose numbers are dwindling because they take longer to bring to slaughter.
Slow Food makes it its business to pluck those products from the remote corners of the countryside where they are produced and bring them to the tables of consumers.
And events like the one in Orvieto and Slow Food's showcase yearly event, the "Salone del Gusto" (Taste Fair), which took place in October in Turin, make that a reality.
The fair attracts hundreds of producers and thousands of food enthusiasts, and includes not only food and wine tastings but events such as a biodiversity award that highlights the work of farmers who use environmentally friendly methods.
Mojoli says Slow Food has rescued from near-extinction some 130 species of food in Italy alone since it la