Audio: Carlo Petrini remarks at the Chapel Hill Creamery, May 23, 2007
While Slow Food USA’s executive director Erika Lesser translates, the international movement’s founder, Carlo Petrini, encourages the crowd to eat well, eat less and respect the earth. Photo by Kirk Ross
By Matthew Fiorentino
Correspondent
In the pasture of the Chapel Hill Creamery, filled with the smells of the finest local foods and the audible sighs of gastronomic pleasure, and surrounded by cows, Carlo Petrini, founder of the global Slow Food movement took in the moment.
After visiting cities like New York, Boston and Chicago, the Italian from Torino looked at the hundreds of people gathered at the roughly 20 kiosks, run by local restaurateurs and chefs who practice the art of Slow Food, with a smile.
“This is a wonderful initiative with lots of beautiful people. I’m very happy with the result,†he said.
He asked for a beer and then admired the backdrop for the event.
“The nature and the green that you have here doesn’t exist in Italy,†he said. “You have forests and meadows and fields, whereas in Italy we have lots of old buildings. I like it here very much.â€
Petrini, who visited the area about nine years ago, returned to find Slow Food efforts in the Triangle running strong.
“The first time I came here I told people I wanted to create Slow Food, and people asked, ‘What’s slow food?’†Petrini reminisced. “I explained that it was a simple idea about slow life. And they said, ‘This guy is crazy.’ But things are changing.â€
So they are. Slow Food now boasts 80,000 members in 850 local chapters around the world. To Petrini, this means that more and more people are throwing the debilitating shackles of consumerism aside (“Enough with consuming,†he cried, shaking his hands furiously.) and are transforming themselves into co-producers.
“The time has come for us to be co-producers,†he said. “Informing ourselves, educating our children, learning about good farming, spending a little more on food, not a lot, but a little bit.â€
He quoted Hippocrates, the ancient Greek philosopher considered to be the father of medicine, and said the cost of cheap food is higher than most people think.
“Food is the first medicine,†he said. “Those who spend too little on food now spend more money on medicine later.â€
He summed up Slow Food’s three basic tenets as enjoying food that’s produced in an environmentally friendly way and at a fair price.
“So eat good food, eat a little less, but eat well,†he said.
He pointed to local successes like the increase in fresh milk, microbreweries and locally produced cheese, as well as the large support for the Farmers’ Market.
“It is much improved,†he said, but there’s still a long way to go.
“It’s nice to see the changes, and I do feel more positive about humanity now. But I never said that we would win the battle. I think we have to fight as best we can. This is all we can do,†he said.
“We need to get many more people with conviction involved with the movement,†he continued. “People need to take on more personal responsibility for the environment and for the food we eat.â€