Slow Food in a Fast Place
Art: Greg Newbold
Rome, 1986, near the Spanish Steps, the Piazza de Spagna: The golden arches of a new McDonald’s appear, a sign of gustatory globalization in the beating heart of Italy. Carlo Petrini, a Leftist with a passion for the delicious as much as for dialectic, salivated for a fight, not for fries. He led a group of protestors armed with bowls of penne, a provocative promotion of authentic tradition and flavor against the threat of Big Macs, and the Slow Food movement was born.
An antagonist with taste, Petrini established Slow Food as the opposite of fast food. In the words of the organization’s manifesto, it seeks to “rediscover the flavors and savor of regional cooking and banish the degrading effects of fast food.” In its concrete support of local farmers and ranchers, cheese makers and artisan bakers, Slow Food opts for taste, not haste.
Fast food is a part of fast life, the life in the fast lane that gets us more quickly to a particular destination. But you can see more from the slow lane, or off the Interstate on a scenic byway. Slow Food seeks that different sort of destination, something to be savored. As the manifesto suggests, “A firm defense of quiet material pleasure is the only way to oppose the universal folly of the Fast Life.”
Carlo Petrini did not catalyze a movement of grim, short-haired old Marxists in black. Slow Food chapters are called “convivium,” celebrating or sharing what in the Manifesto sounds like tantric dining: “suitable doses of guaranteed sensual pleasure and slow, long-lasting enjoyment,” to “preserve us from the contagion of the multitude who mistake frenzy for efficiency.”
Shelburne Farms, Vermont, Summer 2003: An elegantly restored agricultural estate with rambling barns, pastoral green fields, and a large meeting hall where the leaders of US Slow Food convivia convened for their Constitutional Convention. Food lovers are oral folks, and at dinner, with boutique Italian wines, local lamb and artisan cheese feeding the appetites, a hundred happily engaged mouths savored, talked, and built up a grand humming buzz of happy warriors for taste and tradition. National head Patrick Martins spoke of politics and “carnival,” the potentially raucous and liberating celebration of life, and Carlo Petrini came televised from Italy.
The convention marked the maturing of Slow Food USA, an energizing of efforts that continues. Membership now exceeds 10,000, and convivia proliferate. National projects include the Ark of Taste, identifying, preserving and supporting native products and traditions such as wild rice and artisan cheeses. Regional and city guides lead members to the markets, restaurants and bakers in the Slow Food tradition, using the power of the purse to promote “a kinder, gentler capitalism,” (in the words of Newsweek). Books like Eric Schlosser’s “Fast Food Nation,” documentaries like “Super Size Me,” and even a proposed new Food Pyramid, suggest a growing national concern and awareness that we are what we eat, and that there are hidden costs to the “Dollar Menu.”
Autumn 2002, Heber, Utah, at the Snake Creek Grill: Owners Barb and Mike Hill prepare a Fall Harvest lunch for the mem-bers of Slow Food Utah. The meal features mustard crusted pork loin with a sweet onion marmalade and caramel carrots, with much of the produce straight from the Hills’ garden.
Chefs are among the leaders in the Slow Flood movement nationally — Alice Waters, Daniel Boulud, and Deborah Madison, for example — and the same is true in Utah, with Salt Lake City chefs such as Robert Barker of Bambara, Eric Bell of Squatter’s and Tom Grant of Martine supporting the movement.
Barb Hill is a Slow Food kind of gal, making everything in her restaurant from scratch, and taking a “sustainable approach to seafood and produce,” by using her own garden as a source for heirloom tomatoes, sweet onions and garlic. She also employs produce from other local farmers and purveyors. At her restaurant, she serves Morgan Valley Ranch lamb (Utah), artisan cheeses from Cow Girl Creamery (California), and hand-crafted McEvoy olive oil (California). And no sea bass or other fading fish are allowed on her menu.
Utah is not Napa Valley, and the short growing season in the high desert means chefs and foodies need to look beyond the region for much of the year for the finer things in food. But it’s getting better, with more farmers markets and CSA’s (Community Supported Agriculture, where folks “subscribe” to a particular farm for weekly delivery of fresh, seasonal produce, ensuring the farmer a steady income).
The weekly produce delivery from Ranui Gardens (down the road in Dog Holler) includes recipe suggestions composed by Letty Flatt, executive pastry chef at Deer Valley Resort, who learned about Slow Food at the Snake Creek lunch and thought, “This sounds like me.” She tries to eat “low on the food chain,” and believes in the revival of the kitchen “as a vital center in the home, for dinner together as a family or group.” She’s a member of the San Francisco-based “Baker’s Dozen,” inspired by Marion Cunningham (author of the recent best-seller “Lost Recipes: Meals to Share with Friends and Family,” a Slow Food kind of book). “I try to make a choice with my fork,” says Flatt, a vegetarian, who, like Barb Hill, grew up in a family that gathered at dinner around fresh food. Her rustic pear tart will warm both kitchen and family on winter evenings.
Barb Hill and Letty Flatt, both radiantly healthy presences, are testimony to the virtues of life in the slow lane. In a free market, in a rich and democratic nation, we get what we deserve. McDonald’s still prospers, and we have more McJobs, but we also have a lot more organic produce and beef available, more and larger farmers markets, real crusty bread and tangy cheese, more heirloom tomatoes and local brew.
The Slow Food movement acts on the notion that we deserve better than the homogenized products of agribusiness, that food traditions are worthy of pres-ervation and attention. It also believes, as did Carlo Petrini in Rome, that we can make a change with awareness, the power of the purse, and bowls of pasta. You can even bring about change with a simple fork.
Bob King, former leader of Slow Food Utah, is a local food writer and editor; his day job is teaching American Studies at Utah State University.
The international site is at www.slowfood.com. For national information and links, and for membership information ($60 individual, $75 couple, less for students), go to www.slow foodusa.org. Membership has its privileges, including elegant publications and connection to the local Utah “convivium” or chapter. For more information, view www.slowfood.com.
Bob King, former leader of Slow Food Utah, is a local food writer and editor; his day job is teaching American Studies at Utah State University.
Recipes
Barb Hill’s Garden Harvest Onion Marmalade
• 2 large Walla Walla onions (or other sweet type)
• 3/4 T. brandy
• 1/3 t. whole grain mustard
• 1/3 t. sugar
• 1/2 t. raspberry vinegar
• 1/2 t. salt and pepper, or to taste
• 1 T. olive oil
The key to success with this recipe is to let the onions caramelize to bring out their natural sugar. Great with grilled pork chops, burgers, or portabello mushroom sandwiches.
Heat large sauté pan over medium heat. Add olive oil, then place onions, stirring only enough to keep them from burning. Let slowly caramelize. After onions have completely browned, deglaze pan with brandy. Add remaining ingredients, salt and pepper to taste.
Serve warm. Can be refrigerated and reheated.
Letty Flatt’s Rustic Pear Tart
I love to make these open-face free-form galettes because in their simplicity they point to the filling — be it beautiful fruit or a perfectly ripe tomato. Galettes bake most evenly, with rich, golden brown bottoms, when cooked on a baking stone. Be sure to lift the bottom of the tart with a spatula to check the color before removing from the oven. Each galette makes 8 to 10 servings.
Galette Dough
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 t. sea salt
• 3 ounces (6 T.) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1/4 cup ice cold water
Stir the flour and salt together in a medium bowl. With a pastry blender or two forks, cut in the butter, until the pieces are the size of peas. Pour the water over the flour, stirring with a fork until the mixture begins to come together. Gather the dough with your fingers, gently incorporating the drier pieces. Form into a flattened ball. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least one hour.
On a lightly floured surface, roll the chilled dough into a 12- to 13-inch circle. Transfer the dough to a pizza pan or baking sheet. Refrigerate at least 10 minutes.
Makes about 9 ounces of dough, enough for one (9-inch) galette.
Rustic Pear Tart
• Galette Dough, rolled into a 12- or 13-inch circle and chilled
• 3 large Bartlett pears
• 2 T. pine nuts or slivered almonds
• 2 t. plus 1 T. sugar
• 1 T. all-purpose flour
• 1/4 t. ground cinnamon
• 1/4 vanilla bean, optional
Preheat the oven to 400°. Peel, core and halve the pears. Cut side down, slice the pear halves crosswise, 1/4-inch thick, keeping the shape of the pear intact. Remove the chilled dough circle from the refrigerator to allow it to warm just enough to bend the dough without cracking it.
Put the pine nuts, two tablespoons of the sugar, the flour and cinnamon into a food processor work bowl. If using the vanilla bean, cut a lengthwise split in it. Scrape the tiny seedpods out of the inside of the bean and add the seeds to the work bowl. (Keep the unused scraped pod in your sugar container and allow it to perfume the sugar.) Process until the nuts are finely ground. Sprinkle this mixture over the dough, leaving a two-inch border. Transfer the pear slices to the tart using a spatula, then press the pear gently to fan the slices, arranging them on top of the filling. Fold the border up over the fruit, pleating the dough as needed. Lightly brush the exposed rim of pastry with water and sprinkle the crust and the fruit with the remaining tablespoon of sugar.
Bake 40 to 50 minutes, until the pastry is deep golden brown. Serve warm or at room temperature, with lightly sweetened whipped cream or cinnamon ice cream.
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