(((Wow, writing European regional journalism is a lot of fun.)))
http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=3190
Link: Revenge of the Slow.
(...)
Slow Food, in its solemn wisdom, will methodically seek out local producers of the product, raise their consciousness, and then fly them to Italy and unite them in subsidized conferences. The group links local farmers, bakers, millers, and butchers with their peers in other countries: the “Terra Madre” global network. Having built this distribution net, Slow Food offers grants to needy producers for things like barns, butcher shops, and tractors. Then as a final twist, Slow Foodies cheerily eat the end products themselves.
The upshot is an obscure piece of rural heritage cunningly reengineered as a curated service/ product in Europe’s modern food-heritage industry. To Americans it might seem paradoxical that Europe’s rural farmers could be at once blood-and-soil heritage patriots and culture-industry jet-setters whose star clients are wealthy politicized food theorists. But while McDonald’s mechanically peddles burgers to the poor, Slow Food acculturates the planet’s wealthy to the gourmand quality of life long cherished by the European bon vivant. They have about as much in common as an aging shark and a networked swarm of piranhas.
(((I wrote this article some weeks back, but I'd make an addendum now based on further research. If the Slow Food cadres say some kind of food tastes really good – *it's REALLY GOOD.*)))
