On Slow Food

“…1,500 of the 7,000 varieties of fruit that we have in Italy will disappear over the next four to five years…   in today’s world a mere thirty plants meet 95% of food needs, and this is an extremely serious matter:  it means that the level of genetic erosion is very high and is progressing…   every six hours another plant disappears.”

-Carmine Nardone, member of the Agriculture Commission of the Italian Parliament

These unimaginable facts support the first of three goals of the Slow Food movement:  Defense of Biodiversity.  Supporters of the movement seek to promote the enjoyment of excellent food and drink while at the same time saving traditional grains, fruits, vegetables, animal breeds and other food products that are disappearing, thanks to big agribusiness and convenience foods.

Who doesn’t want excellent food and drink?  Especially if you can save a disappearing plant at the same time.

Formed in Italy in 1986 as Arcigola, the forerunner to the international Slow Food movement, their manifesto was signed in 1989.  One notable quote from that important document:

“We are enslaved by speed and have all succumbed to the same insidious virus: ‘Fast Life’, which disrupts our habits, pervades the privacy of our homes and forces us to eat ‘Fast Foods’.”

(A McDonald’s had just opened their orange and yellow doors in Rome’s famous Piazza di Spagna.)

It goes on to say “…our defense should begin at the table with ‘Slow Food’.“

In addition to defense of biodiversity, this movement has two other primary missions.

The First: Spreading taste education by helping people rediscover the joys of eating and teaching them to understand and care about where their foods came from and how they were made. 

The Second: Linking producers and co-producers through events both locally and internationally, where consumers can also be connected with high quality, artisanal products to which they would not normally have access.

Some Slow Food trivia:  Did you know that ‘wild rice’ isn’t actually a rice?

It’s the seed of an aquatic grass, Zizania aquatica.  It grows wild (wow, imagine that!) along lakesides and rivers in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and parts of Canada.  True wild rice is grown naturally, harvested by canoe-paddling Native Americans, and then hand-parched over a wood fire. 

Sounds very different from the wild rice I buy, which is machine-cultivated, machine-harvested, and machine-parched, then sold in machine-sealed plastic bags in my local American grocery store.

I found out about Slow Food quite by accident.  Research for an infant gourmet foods company led me to Slow Food Dallas, the local convivium in my area.  Then, I saw an episode of Todd English’s public television series, Food Trip with Todd English.  The show traveled across Italy, visiting local food producers who still did things the ‘Slow Food’ way.  (P.S. ladies, Todd English is cute and he cooks.)

I plan to support the movement, but I have to confess it will take time for me to understand how to move more slowly and spend more money on better food.  Maybe a twelve step program is in order.