May 2007

Healthy Culinary Traditions

Cowell Theater

Books like the best-selling Fast Food Nation have alerted the public to the risks posed by genetically modified organisms, food-borne diseases, and a centralized corporate food system. In Slow Food Nation, Italian-born Carlo Petrini — the founder and driving force behind the Slow Food movement — offers models for reforming the way food is grown, prepared, and eaten.

On Thursday, May 10, the Museo ItaloAmericano and Instituto Italiano de Cultura host the charismatic Petrini for a talk at Fort Mason Center’s Cowell Theater. After an initial book signing, he will describe his organization’s efforts to improve the world’s food supply — one bite at a time. Following the lecture, food and wine will be served in the Cowell Theater lobby.

Slow Food International, with more than 80,000 members in 100 countries, is a non-profit, “eco-gastronomic” organization that Petrini started in Italy in 1986 in response to the opening of a McDonald’s restaurant in Rome. The movement works to counteract fast food and fast life, the disappearance of traditional local food, and people’s dwindling interest in what they eat and how food choices affect the global environment and economy. “Slow Food’s straightforward message is hard to argue with,” writes The Washington Post. “Foods and food preservation that have given culinary pleasure for decades (or much longer) should be treasured and preserved.”

Petrini was elected president of Slow Food International at its inception and every year since. He was recently proclaimed a “great innovator” in Time’s list of “European Heroes” and is currently a professor of sociology at the Università di Trento. In 2004, he initiated a biennial conference called Terra Madre where 5,000 small-scale farmers, cooks, and food experts gather to share knowledge and build connections. Every year, students from around the globe matriculate at the University of Gastronomic Sciences, which Petrini also founded in 2004.

For more about the event, see the calendar listing for May 10 or visit www.museoitaloamericano.org.

— Aaron Lehmer

Photos (from top):

Carlo Petrini, Founder of Slow Food International

Slow Food Nation by Carlo Petrini