gastronomy

It's rare to find a book that's informative, convivial, and inspiring. Carlo Petrini's Slow Food: The Case for Taste is such a book. True to his Italian character and culture, he describes the Slow Food movement with style and exuberance. He would make a convert of me if I had not already embraced his philosophy for the "good life". I share his passion for excellence in food and wine and the responsibilities that are attached to this pleasure. Petrini would make an excellent dinner guest, bringing gusto and reverence for the meal served and adding intelligent, sometimes jovial chatter throughout each course.

Back in the 70s, E.F. Schumacher wrote Small is Beautiful, creating a movement that eventually became a cliche. In smallness we find our human scale and through smallness it is possible to express our uniqueness. The Slow Food movement has taken this concept and added a few additional ingredients which make life pleasurable. I think Petrini's book can have as strong of an impact on the new millennium as Schumacher's book had in the 70s.

Much credit should be given to the translators for maintaining the integrity of Petrini's literary style.

In 1989, author, cook and visionary Carlo Petrini founded the International Slow Food Movement as response to our fast-food lifestyle. The movement now has a magazine, a web site, and over 400,000 followers organized into local chapters. With a foreword written by Alice Waters, it's no surprise to learn that Petrini advocates the same philosophy as Chez Panisse's founder: traditional recipes, locally grown foods and wines, and eating as an event.
It's a small book, only 170 pages, but it packs a wallop as a philosophy, a recipe for Life.

"May suitable doses of of guaranteed sensual pleasure and slow, long-lasting enjoyment preserve us from the contagion of the multitude who mistake frenzy for efficiency." -Slow Food "Manifesto"

Far from what one of the "professional" reviewers here at Amazon called "didactic" (although I think he meant to say "pedantic"), Carlo Petrini sets out in brief (110 pages), a concise explanation of the need for Slow Food. While one may indeed need to be literate to understand what he has to say, it is nonetheless an approachable, comprehensible explanation of a maligned and misunderstood movement. Slow Food is NOT just a bunch of yuppie foodies stuffing their craws with foie gras. Recognizing that the enjoyment of wholesome food is essential to the pursuit of hapiness, Slow Food is an educational organization dedicated to stewardship of the land and ecologically sound food production; to the revival of the kitchen and the table as centers of pleasure, culture and community; to the invigoration and proliferation of regional, seasonal culinary traditions; and to living a slower and more harmonious rhythm of life.

How can you argue with that? We will take an enourmous leap forward when we as a country and a culture put as much thought and effort into our food as we do into our entertainment. Read the book and stop being enslaved by the industrial standardization of tastes.