Why Italians Love to Talk About Food (44 page)

On the other hand, an overly serious attitude toward diet as an end in itself has always evoked laughter and ironic detachment, as in Gadda's
Cognizione del dolore
(
Acquainted with Grief
), 1963:

 

“They eat too much,” the doctor opined to himself. “Half an apple, a slice of wholewheat bread that is so tasty to the tongue and contains all the vitamins, from A to H, no exception. . . That's the ideal meal for a fit man! . . . what am I saying . . . for a normal man . . . Anything more than that is simply a burden for the stomach. And for the body. An enemy illegally introduced into the body, like the Danai in the gates of Troy . . .” (this is just what he thought) “which the gastrointestinal tract is then forced to reduce to a pulp, knead, and eliminate . . . The peptonization of albuminoids! And the liver! The pancreas! The amidification of fats! The saccharification of starches and glucoses! . . . a word! . . . I'd like to see them! . . . At most, in critical seasons, one may grant the addition of a few seasonal vegetables . . . raw or cooked . . . pods . . . peas . . .”
¹⁵

 

All the more reason why esoteric diets do not enjoy great prestige nowadays. Experimental trends aren't terribly authoritative. Many would probably be horrified at the Brat-man Test, publicized in the American and European press and on the Internet, whose first question reads: “Do you spend more than 3 hours a day thinking about your diet?” The test is intended to reveal the symptoms of orthorexia (
orthorexia nervosa
), a pathology described for the first time by Dr. Steven Bratman of the University of Colorado in an article devoted to the morbid fixation on healthful eating.
¹⁶
The International European Food Council warns that excessive attention to issues relating to one's diet and to the quality of foods is no longer a trend, but an illness. There is a specialized center at the Policlinico Umberto I hospital in Rome, to treat people suffering from eating disorders: there people are taught not to be too concerned about the quality of what they eat.

But in Italy, thank heavens, most people still tend to sensibly follow the culinary and gastronomic traditions of their forefathers (see “
Slow Food
”). It is a fine Mediterranean custom that Italians are unable and unwilling to give up.

Farther south and east of Lazio, a harsh continental climate zone forms part of the Italian mosaic. Abruzzo is the ceiling of the Apennines, rising to almost three thousand meters, with the summit of the Gran Sasso (2,912 meters). Half the region is occupied by a national park protected by the state since 1872. Today it has grown to 44,000 hectares and is populated by Marsican brown bears (that is, bears typical of areas where the population of the Marsi once lived), Apennine wolves, Abruzzo chamois, deer, roe, golden eagles, otters, wildcats, alpine and sea choughs (sea crows), Dalmatian woodpeckers, and ravens. The first three of these animal species are practically nonexistent in the rest of Italy.

The climate in this area is frigid, so let the hot red pepper rage! Everything is pungent and spicy: from the strong, diabolical Centerbe liqueur to the intensely peppered meat that is eaten in Abruzzo. Up until a few decades ago, herdsmen and breeders were prevalent among the inhabitants. Only recently has industry in Abruzzo begun to develop more intensively, and to change the character of the region.

The abundance of proteins in the local diet clearly shows that this is a mountainous area. With all those mountains, it is difficult to talk about farming! Moreover, Molise, the ancient Samnium, is a land that has a high seismic risk. The economy is based upon tourism and animal breeding (though actually an industry for construction materials, ceramics, and glass has also developed in recent years). As for animal breeding, cattle naturally cannot graze on such steep slopes, so Abruzzo is a grazing land for sheep and goats.

By Alexey Pivovarov / Prospekt

Prospekt is a Milan-based independent photo agency representing photojournalists based in Milan, Rome, Paris, London, Istanbul, Berlin, and New York. Prospekt photographers work on European and international news and features. Founded in early 2005 and directed by the photographer Samuele Pellecchia, Prospekt aims to produce surveys and reports bringing out of the value of each photographer's identity.

Sheep and goats, bucolic traditions that are almost ancient Greek. As in other regions of Italy, rejected lambs and unweaned kids end up on the table more often than not.

Abruzzo cooks are also wizards at cooking kid meat: according to Molise custom, it is stewed in red wine with rosemary, sage, bay leaves, and spicy red pepper.

What don't they say about the villagers here! Abruzzo is surrounded by eccentric, picturesque legends. From a historical and anthropological viewpoint as well, relations between people here have always had a particular distinction. No matter what the ruling power—Lombards, Normans, Swabians, Angevins, Aragonese, Spaniards,
Austrians, Bourbons—given the conditions of feudal backwardness, it was not these foreign conquerors who dominated the region, but the laws of poverty. Bandits were rife everywhere. It is understandable that the region's main typical dish is called
pecora alla brigante
(bandit-style sheep). More than any other social relationship, an ability to come to terms with the criminal elements was highly valued. And also with the charcoal burners, the
carbonai
, who throughout the year, in the dense forests, produced wood coal for sale (one of the local resources).

“From a strategic point of view, Abruzzo is notable for the fact that only one road leads there, extremely difficult for an army to traverse,” says the Russian Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary from the early years of the twentieth century. The Guelphs had earlier sought protection against their political enemies from the
carbonai
in Abruzzo, actually hiding in their huts to escape the Ghibellines in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. On these mountains, Joachim Murat and the patriots fighting the tyranny of the Bourbons and French domination in Naples sought refuge from the king of Naples's troops. And those affiliated with the secret society that played such a large role in the history of the Italian Risorgimento, the Carbonari, took their name and symbols from the
carbonai
. Exalted as heroes by romantic writers, its adherents would enter history and the lexicon of European languages. Like the Freemasons, with whom they had much in common, the Carbonari shrouded their meetings in great secrecy, created a whole system of mystical rites, and developed their own phraseology, whose expressions were in part borrowed from Holy Scriptures, in part from their occupation as charcoal burners. The meeting place of the Carbonari was called the
baracca
(shack), the province where the encounter took place was called the “forest,” the meeting itself a “lodge,” a group of shacks a “republic.” “Clearing the forest of wolves” meant liberating the country from tyrants. The symbol of tyranny was the wolf; they saw its greatest victim in Christ, symbolized by the lamb. The phrase “take revenge on the wolf that oppresses the lamb” became the society's watchword. Indicative, in the context of our culinary analysis, is this metaphor of the lamb, which is precisely the basic food of these areas.

It is fitting that an extremely widespread, typical Italian dish such as
pasta alla carbonara
, which takes its name from these same
carbonai
who cooked and ate it, was born here. Any self-respecting hermit cannot fail to have a supply of salt pork (usually pork cheek or
guanciale
, pancetta, or fatback) and goat cheese. That was all that was needed for pasta carbonara. A fresh egg could always be found in the woods, in the nest of some quail.

Pasta carbonara is sautéed in the same pan where cubed
guanciale
or pancetta has first been browned, that is, in pork fat, and then the raw egg is poured over it; the dish is sprinkled with grated pecorino cheese and seasoned with plenty of pepper, then heated a little more and eaten directly from the pan. Carbonara enjoys great popularity throughout Italy, especially in Lazio.

The Abruzzese population is used to ruggedly withstanding nature and is prepared to compete against it for its own vital space. One of Italy's major planning projects was achieved here, over a long period of time, like most major projects in Italy. The work was begun by the ancient Romans and completed in the year of Italy's unification (1860). The project involved the plain of Lake Fucino (later Lake Celano, Capestrano). The decision was made to reclaim vast stretches of land that could not be used for farming and prevent the flooding that submerged the region each spring (Lake Fucino is situated at a high altitude, in the crater of an extinct volcano).

The first major efforts intended to prevent flooding and drain the vast marshes around the lake were carried out by that great organizer Emperor Claudius in the first century
A.D.
After constructing the chief Roman aqueduct (Aqua Claudia) and the port of Ostia, Claudius had an underground sluice designed to drain water from the Fucino. Then a deviation channel 4,700 meters long was dug at a depth of 14 meters (eleven years of work, involving the labor of 30,000 slaves). The inhabitants of the region could finally breathe a sigh of relief: water finally flowed into the Liri River. It is true that maintaining this tunnel turned out to be quite complex after just a few centuries. And after more than a millennium and a half, the situation became absolutely disastrous: the underground channel was continuously obstructed, probably due in part to underground volcanic shocks.

In 1852, Prince Alessandrio Torlonia proposed draining the lake completely, though it was not a small one: 165 square kilometers. Having obtained the government's guarantee that the reclaimed lands would be his, he organized the excavation of a new underground tunnel, at a greater depth than the previous one. The work was completed after the unification of Italy and Prince Torlonia acquired vast holdings; there he settled colonists brought from neighboring regions (the Abruzzese have always been few in number). But at that point it was found that the general climate of the region had become harsher, precisely because of the elimination of that gigantic body of water: the famous centuries-old olive trees died, and only sugar beets could be grown on the reclaimed lands.