What’s in the Food?
I’m pretty sure I’m not revealing anything you don’t know if I tell you that food in Italy is amazing. Whether it’s eating at a restaurant or home-cooked meals, the quality of what you are likely to stumble upon is incredible. Each region has its specialties. From polenta, cheese and meat in the north to seafood all along the coast, you’d be hard pressed to find a region of Italy that doesn’t produce masterpieces. To make this even better, prices are a fraction of what you are typically asked to pay in U.S. Yesterday, for lunch my lady had insanely well-cooked lasagna, trout, tomatoes and cauliflowers. Price? 13 euros. Where I live in U.S., you can barely get fast food for that price.
This, however, is not an advertisement trying to sell you on the joys of eating in Italy. Let me start with some anecdotal evidence. A couple of years ago, I was visiting a friend in Puglia. Every day she fed us enough that I thought I was going to explode. Every night it was multiple courses plus wine and dessert. And yet, the food was so good that I couldn’t restrain myself. I figured there’d be time to cut down on my food intake once I returned home. When I landed back in the good, ole US of A, I was certain I had picked up at least 10 lbs. That was an optimistic assessment, considering I had been eating about twice as much as I was used to. When I got on the scale, I couldn’t believe it. I had lost one pound.
Talking with people from other parts of the world (not just Italians), most of them had similar stories. They’d eat certain foods in their home countries, and they’d be doing well. They’d eat the same exact foods in U.S. and gain massive amounts of weight. While it’s true that people in certain countries are used to walking and moving a whole lot more than is common in US, I had seen for myself that even during Italian visits where I did preciously little other than eating and sitting on my ass, the results were similar. In other words, it wasn’t the amount of movement that changed things. It was the food itself.
Making the whole business even weirder, weight-gain (or lack of thereof) was only one part of the equation. My lady can hardly eat cheese in U.S. without feeling bloated and heavy. In Italy, she regularly eats cheese in industrial amounts with zero problems. Other people I know find that acid reflux problems that bother them in U.S. don’t show up when eating in Italy. Ditto for reactions to gluten. They are either substantially diminished or they vanish altogether.
I’m neither a nutritionist nor a scientist, so I am not sure of the reason why. I heard interesting theories about the use of pesticides and preservatives in U.S. compared to places like Italy. The theories are interesting, but I just don’t have the necessary expertise to be sure either way. But what I do know is that I’d love to see scientific experiments to figure out why food in US seems to be tied to so many more problems. And once we can conclusively figure out the answer, I’d love to see policies passed to protect the health of citizens. Between the obesity crisis, diabetes, and a zillion health issues tied to food, this is an issue that is causing billions of dollars in damage, not to mention untold amounts of suffering.
On that note, it’s dinner time. A glorious plate of pasta awaits me.
I definitely think there is something to this—additives, preservatives, and processing add a lot of crap to our food and crowd out more whole, unprocessed or artisanally processed foods. But I also think the environment and manner in which we consume foods makes a difference—in the US, food is often on the go, quick fuel. People are stressed, overly focused on calories, not enjoying their food. In Europe and many other places, people sit down and savor, eat slowly, and really enjoy their food and the people they are eating it with. People don’t finish in ten minutes and go back to their screen. Nine times out of ten, you are probably walking somewhere after your meal as well. I think this makes a huge difference in how much we eat, how we digest it, and how our body uses the food. 2 cents.
I cook and travel a lot. I mean that when I travel, I cook. In Italy, they are seemingly not allowed to poison the food supply, which is kind of weird. Which is maybe why all the food tastes so radically different. There are some odd features to the food production... like that you can hang around the Po Valley as long as you like, but the cows will never come home. They seem to all live in buildings. Ditto the pigs. The sheep. The goats. Presumably to manage the flavour profile of the animals and products. On the other hand, in Sicily, maybe the most Italian part of Italy, is simply erupting with vigorous growth on land and sea, ruminating animals in the fields and humans bent over green patches of goodies. And nothing tastes the same. Not the bread, the cheese, the oil, vinegar, tomatoes, carrots or salad greens. I didn't mention the wine, huh? Please keep the secret that Sicily produces some of the most complex and fine wines in Italy. If your wine is Chianti, stay away from Nero D'avola unless you want to fall in love with a whole new grape. So, while I spend a lot of effort trying to make Italian foods in Canada, once in the old country, creating fine foods is like falling off a log.