On the occasion of SCIM 2023 - Week of Italian Cuisine in the World, here we are at a new chapter on the history of the cuisine of emigration, presented in the project I Racconti delle Radici, in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. Today we present the article by Elisabetta Moro, full professor of Cultural Anthropology at the University of Naples Suor Orsola Benincasa, holder at the University of Naples Federico II of the History of Gastronomy of the Mediterranean Countries, member of the Assembly of the Italian National Unesco Commission and director of the Virtual Museum of the Mediterranean Diet. Moro examines the deep connection with his own "mother tongue cuisine," establishing an effective parallel with language: just as there is a mother tongue, in fact, so too is a food, a cuisine, a gastronomy that speaks the language of the soul.
THE CUISINE OF THE SOUL BY ELISABETTA MORO
«Man is what he eats» said the philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach. But when the man emigrates, eating then becomes the home of his soul. The recipes become his prayers. And the flavours his memory. And Sunday lunch is the sap that nourishes his family tree, bringing it back to the depths of its roots, but also projecting it with new branches towards the future. Because the relationship that people have with nutrition is similar to the relationship they have with language. Food and speech are natural and cultural at the same time, and obey partially unconscious rules that are learned even in the prenatal period. There are those who talk about ‘maternal nutrition’ just as they talk about ‘mother tongue’. Because the first food experiences, just like linguistic ones, leave indelible traces. And they become even more noticeable in the dishes of Italians abroad, who have transformed tomatoes, parmesan, mozzarella and basil into many colours of Italianness. Italians, in fact, always carry with them the baggage of their gastronomic culture. This is demonstrated by the flourishing history of Italian cuisine abroad, which for a few centuries has cooked up recipes that are, at the same time, both old and new. Like Italian-American spaghetti with meatballs, a new generation of dish derived from spaghetti alla chitarra con i pallottini from Abruzzo and the use of meatballs in pasta bakes from the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Or like pizza with clams, which is neither a new invention nor an absurdity, given that in the mid-eighteenth century in the alleys of Naples where pizza was born, anchovies and clams were placed on a round leavened dough seasoned with garlic and oil. In fact, those who emigrate preserve and amalgamate, they remember and renew. Thus the Italian Sunday lunch is still a ritual today, in which the homeland is recalled in the pots of ragù and the smells of roasted lasagne. It was once prepared by grandmothers, but today is purchased already made, because it is hard to find time to cook. But on the other hand it is vital to remember how to do it, to renew that sense of identity. But what is identity, really? It is really the home of the soul. And when we think that the Greek word díaita – from which the Italian dieta, the English diet, and the Spanish dieta all derive – means dwelling, then it becomes clear that all Italian cuisines, without exception, are the foundations of our community in the world.
POLENTA WITH CARROTS AND PEAS
An everyday food for northern Italians who emigrated to France and Belgium, polenta still features prominently in their cuisine even after the end of post-war austerity
For many immigrants from Northern Italy to France and Belgium, the everyday food was polenta before and after the Second World War, and it remained so for a long time, even after the living standards improved in the countries of arrival. The French director Alain Ughetto, author of the animated film about Italian immigration to France, Manodopera (2023), recalled that his “grandmother Cesira would start cooking in the morning: polenta and milk for breakfast, polenta and stewed rabbit at midday and baked polenta gratin in the evening”. The researcher Leen Beyers studied the eating habits of three generations of Italian immigrants who arrived in Belgium as part of the 1946 Italian-Belgian protocol which allowed the exchange of coal for workers to be employed in the country’s mines. The immigrants, who came from Ciociaria, Veneto and Emilia, were all hosted together in a building which was contemptuously nicknamed the Château des Italiens. During the holidays, the immigrants from the north prepared lasagna Bolognese with bechamel and those from the south made lasagna with meatballs, hard-boiled eggs and pecorino, while on working days everyone mostly ate polenta. Beyers noticed how the immigrant women who were most inclined to welcome elements of Belgian cuisine as a sign of integration had invented polenta with carrots and peas to imitate stoemp, a very popular dish in Belgium, in which vegetables are mixed with mashed potatoes. (ph Davide Maestri)
Cook Emanuele Frigerio
Effort Easy
Time 1 hour
Vegetarian
INGREDIENTS FOR 10 PEOPLE
500g corn flour for polenta
150g boiled peas
150g carrots
30g onion
extra virgin olive oil
salt – pepper
Chop the onion and sauté it in a pan with 2 tablespoons of oil.
Peel the carrots and cut them into round slices, then add them to the onion.
Season with salt and pepper and cook for 2-3 minutes. Then add the peas, as well as a little water, and cook for about 15 minutes.
Prepare the polenta by pouring the flour into 1.5 litres of boiling salted water. Cook it, keeping stirring, for about 45 minutes. It should be quite soft at the end.
Serve it together with the vegetables and season with freshly ground pepper.