Balance of Food

Stanley Tucci shows the diversity of Italy and the common theme of cucina povera

In Rome, pasta is like a way of life. You eat it every day. Enjoy the iconic dishes on the new @CNN Original Series, Stanley Tucci #SearchingforItaly. Sunday at 9p ET/PT pic.twitter.com/3Aw4hfjf9x

— CNN Original Series (@CNNOriginals) February 20, 2021

Italian cuisine is very different depending on where you are in the country. The distance between Rome and Florence is about 174 miles or 280 kilometres; that distance is not as long as the difference between salted bread and unsalted bread.

Stanley Tucci's recent CNN series Searching for Italy strove to illustrate the food contrasts between regions. The show covered Naples and the Amalfi Coast, Rome, Bologna, Milan, Tuscany, and Sicily.

Milan stood out as northern Italian cuisine (think polenta instead of pasta). The difference in southern Italy exists but is a bit more subtle. Bologna (Emilia-Romagna) was more about ingredients than dishes. The Tuscany episode was filled with his personal experiences about living there for a year as a child.

Italian cuisine is so different because of the history of Italy, the relatively brief time brought together as a country and the centuries that preceded that time. Regional cuisine existed getting to another part of Italy was a lot more difficult back in the time.

Even in the different parts of Italy, the common theme is cucina povera aka poor kitchen. They didn't always get the best of the animals to use. Tripe is a sandwich filling in Tuscany. The guanciale craved in Rome for amatriciana sauce is bacon made from the pig jowl. The cappelletti pasta in Emilia-Romagna made from flour and water since the priests often kept the eggs for themselves. The saga of unsalted bread in Florence has many paths; salt was rather valuable in long ago times.

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Italy has very high standards for food labels. The common practice is to list the foods from highest to lowest content. Italy goes a step further to give percentages for how much of something is in a can or a jar.

Italians have learned to do a lot with a little. Tucci visited SantoPalato in Rome. The offal restaurant from chef Sarah Cicolini featured "a frittata with mashed chicken offal; Roman tripe cooked in tomatoes; wagyu heart tartare; and oxtail meatball with peanut, wild celery and cocoa powder sauce." Mmmmm?

Restaurants featured on the show (CNN)

Classic Italian dishes (CNN)

The mercatos (markets) are crucial for the Italian home cook to put together the simple ingredients into fabulous dishes. Tucci visited Mercato di Sant'Ambrogio and Mercato Centrale in Florence.

Emilia-Romagna does have balsamic vinegar, prosciutto di Parma, and Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, so not all of the food is cucina povera. Tucci did a segment on a scandal of fake proscuitto and talked about the "fake cans" of San Marzano tomatoes. Italy cares about authenticity because there are so many people wanting to do shortcuts. Tucci didn't mention the issue with some "olive oils" not being as authentic.

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If you haven't thought about the difference between northern and southern Italian cuisine, watching the veal cutlets in Milan might have made you think about Austria or Bavaria in southern Germany more than Italy. You should not be shocked to find out that your humble narrator found the Milan episode to be the least likely to stir an appetite.

Italian food, food in Italy is simple ingredients, a strive for quality, and care in putting them all together. Maybe you will go to see for yourself when the pandemic subsides.

The Stanley Tucci series ran earlier this year on CNN. You can access episodes on demand through CNN. There will be a Season 2 in 2022.

Twitter capture: @CNNOriginals
photos credit: Searching for Italy/CNN

Know your food, even if it comes from a truck

"Those restaurants that get their food from Sysco and GFS where the food tastes the same."

That is the gist of what a farmer friend of mine said about certain restaurants. That felt like an inside joke, unless you know how most restaurants work.

Owning a restaurant is hard. If you have read Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain, you have some sense of what goes into food ordering in New York City with a lot more resources to get quality food into a restaurant.

In a small town where we both were (she lives there, I was visiting), there are not huge markets where chefs in restaurants can go to find local, quality food. Ordering food is easier if you can get large trucks to deliver basic supplies. This is where Sysco and Gordon Food Service (GFS) have made their mark.

You might have even gone to the GFS stores. A great place to get takeaway cups and dispensers. Not the best place to buy ketchup.

Sysco and GFS and other similar companies provide food to restaurants, cafeterias, and other food places. The food is safe, clean, and cheap. Restaurants cite costs as a burden. If they think the customers won't care about an item, they will likely find the cheapest version.

The standard American palette likely doesn't care, or not enough to voice concern. They may not care that certain foods taste the same no matter where they might go. The fast food industry relies on the idea that you will get the same food, regardless of location. Sysco and GFS likely service more restaurants than McDonald's has locations.

My first food working experience was at the gone but not forgotten Bill Knapp's. Bill Knapp's was a regional, family restaurant chain with its food trucks. The food came about 75 miles down the highway; proprietary food to be a Bill Knapp's location. Food trucks, in this incarnation, are quite valuable to restaurants.

You might react by citing this story as yet another example of food snobbery. "You said the food is safe, clean, and cheap. So what?" We cite "know your farmer, know your food" so the similar cry would be "know the truck, know your food." Information is power.

The customers who eat at the places serviced by Sysco and GFS should know where their food comes from. They aren't likely to care but they should know. They might like the idea of uniformity and presentation in the spirit of their favorite fast food chains.

Knowing can be a sign to reconsider decisions or doubling down on them. You give information to people and let them decide what they want to do with that information.

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You likely cooked at home for most of the time for over a year. You used better ingredients or had access to better ingredients. Ketchup is a good example: you can buy a better ketchup in a grocery store than you will likely find in most restaurants.

We set higher standards at home where you pay less for each meal with the same ingredients. We pay more to eat out because of time and convenience, quality of their ingredients, and because they can cook certain foods better than we do.

If you reward restaurants that order from Sysco and Gordon Food Service, you are announcing that you don't care about what they serve you. Ideally, those companies would still serve their customers (restaurants) but with improved quality food demanded by the customers of the customers.

Most Americans won't care. Do you?

photos credit: me