SAN FRANCISCO — No doubt you've heard the saying that some people eat to live. Carlo Petrini lives to eat.
To this Italian Renaissance man of haute cuisine, food and wine are more than mere sustenance. They are a way of life, and a philosophical statement. Not to mention the focal point of a budding society.
Petrini, visiting the United States recently, spoke more of sociology than food and wine when explaining his current fascination with what he calls Slow Food.
\o7 Slow Food \f7 is capitalized to show that it is, in fact, an international movement, not mere counterpoint to the fast food craze that has millions of Americans eating on the run.
As a formal idea for the last decade of the century, Slow Food \o7 (cucina lenta, \f7 in Italian) has as its mascot the snail.
"Escargot," said the bearded Petrini with a wink.
Petrini is a wine and food writer and founder of Arcigola, an association formed in Italy to promote good dining and drinking. It is the progenitor of Slow Food, but Arcigola will be abandoned by the end of the year as Slow Food takes its place.
The idea, he says, is to focus on the historical and cultural impact of food on society, and to explore such topics as why fast food has become popular and why it leads to a destruction of our cultural heritage. And what can be done about it. In the midst of this discussion, Petrini uses terms like \o7 gastrophobia.\f7
"We oppose the creation of a standardized type of food," said Petrini, referring specifically to the ubiquitous American hamburger that has swept Europe in the last decade.
"We want people to respect the gastronomic culture of an area, the regional cuisine. The real danger is that standardization will eventually kill local cooking. And wine, of course, is an integral part of regional cuisine."
But there are other reasons Slow Food exists. Petrini is eager to elucidate:
"Philosophically, we are against the culture of fastness. We should eat slowly. We should strive to attain the pleasures that can be found in eating over a longer period of time, savoring our food, instead of eating a sandwich in 10 minutes.
"Think of the psychological damage, the managerial damage, the damage to our interpersonal relationships."
Petrini also is worried about how standardization of food could lead to a homogeneity of cultures, and he says this struck him most forcefully in 1987 when a McDonald's first opened in the Piazza Navona in Rome.
