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ACCADEMIA ITALIANA DELLA CUCINAA CULTURAL INSTITUTION OF THE REPUBLIC OF ITALY

FOUNDED IN 1953 BY ORIO VERGANI

www.accademia1953.it

CIVILTÀDELLATAVOLAACCADEMIA ITALIANA DELLA CUCINA

INTERNATIONAL

EDITION

CdT_275_COVER_INGLESE_Acca 13/11/15 12:47 Pagina 1

FOCUS2 Perfection in the kitchen: utopia or reality? (Paolo Petroni)

ACADEMIC COUNCIL3 An increasingly dynamic Academy (Silvia De Lorenzo)

CULTURE AND RESEARCH5 An open debate on food (Massimo Vincenzini)

7 Saint Martin: celebrating wine, stirring life (Stelio Smotlak)

8 It’s time for an aperitivo (Antonietta Stroili)

10 Food and painting (Aldo Andreolo)

On the cover: Graphic depiction of a detail fromthe painting “Autumn” (1896) by Alfons MariaMucha, on exhibition at the Mucha Museum inPrague.

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INTERNATIONAL EDITION

NOVEMBER 2015 / N. 276

EDITOR IN CHIEFPAOLO PETRONI

COPY EDITORSILVIA DE LORENZO

LAYOUTSIMONA MONGIU

TRASLATORNICOLA LEA FURLAN

THIS ISSUE INCLUDES ARTICLES BYAldo Andreolo,

Silvia De Lorenzo,Paolo Petroni,Stelio Smotlak,

Antonietta Stroili,Massimo Vincenzini.

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PUBLISHERACCADEMIA ITALIANA DELLA CUCINA

VIA NAPO TORRIANI 31 - 20124 MILANOTEL. 02 66987018 - FAX 02 66987008

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MONTHLY MAGAZINEREG. N. 4049 - 29-5-1956

TRIBUNALE DI MILANO

Rivista associataall’Unione StampaPeriodica Italiana

L’ACCADEMIA ITALIANA DELLA CUCINAFOUNDED IN 1953 BY ORIO VERGANI

AND LUIGI BERTETT, DINO BUZZATI TRAVERSO,CESARE CHIODI, GIANNINO CITTERIO,

ERNESTO DONÀ DALLE ROSE, MICHELE GUIDO FRANCI,GIANNI MAZZOCCHI BASTONI, ARNOLDO MONDADORI, ATTILIO NAVA, ARTURO ORVIETO, SEVERINO PAGANI,

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S O M M A R I OT A B L E O F C O N T E N T S

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S O M M A R I OF C U S

BY PAOLO PETRONIPresident of the Academy

I n addition to falling leaves, au-tumn brings the hypermedia pre-sentation of restaurant guides. As

usual, the talk is all about the top esta-blishments and chefs who strive to se-cure that fraction of a vote, sometimesfor the better and rarely for the worse.This year, the most talk was about thescore 20/20, the very top score, givenby L’Espresso guide to Massimo Bottu-ra, of the Osteria Francescana in Mo-dena. An enthusiastic review, so muchso that it was signed by the Editor, en-ded in this fashion: “Massimo Botturais the best chef who was ever born inItaly and I am happy to live in his ti-me”. The statement that Bottura “haschanged forever the way we eat” givesthe impression that we have reachedthe top and that there is no way to fur-ther improve unless of course in thefuture we can embellish the score bygiving it 20 with honors. Right behindBottura, with a sliver of score, at19.75/20 on the way up, comes Enri-co Crippa of the restaurant PiazzaDuomo in Alba. The new guide Gam-bero Rosso is in agreement in assi-gning first place to Massimo Bottura,in conjunction with Heinz Beck’s La

Pergola in Rome, with a score of95/100, a very high score indeed, butnot the top, most importantly the sa-me score given to Beck’s restaurantlast year. As we wait for the emergen-ce of the queen of restaurant guides,the red Michelin, the criticized and re-viled TripAdvisor has put to work itsmysterious algorithms to produce theranking of the restaurants that arepreferred by the thousands of users ofits celebrated online guide. In otherwords, the voice of the people vs. theélite of specialized gastronomes. Toour great surprise, we find that Trip-Advisor’s top restaurant is one that isnot even mentioned by the guides, theRiviera of Venice, opened a few yearsago by the musician Giovanni PietroCremonini (1,333 reviews). The se-cond spot belongs to Pipero al Rex inRome. Piazza Duomo of Alba turns upin fourth place. Massimo Bottura andother highly regarded restaurantssuch as Le Calandre of the Alajmo bro-thers, Casadonna-Reale of Niko Romi-to and Villa Crespi of Antonino Canna-vacciuolo do not even appear on thelist of the Top Ten. Obviously, the dif-ferent criteria of evaluation and mea-

surement instruments are not compa-rable. It is true that we are discussingthe same subject matter, which is easyenough; in other words, the discourseis about how we eat in a restaurant,and yet a perfect dish for one guide in-spector can nettle or fail to impressanother inspector or a common client.In the past, we made the point thatquite often the guides are self referen-tial, that prizes make the recipientshappy, but that free criticism andmost of all the various ways that onecan evaluate modern Italian cuisineare values that must be jealously pre-served. When we sit at a restaurant’stable, we must evaluate it accordingto our own tastes, with intellectual ho-nesty, without adulation, or personalantipathy. Guides are a useful prop,while representing somebody else’sjudgment: to dissent is legitimate andcalled for, but ignoring them andshrugging one’s shoulders is not thecorrect behavior. Curiosity is the engi-ne that moves the world. If there isnothing new to discover, if nothingcan stir up an emotion, going to a re-staurant is merely a costly way nouri-shing ourselves.

Perfection in the kitchen: utopia or reality?The questionable ranking of the new restaurant guides.

Massimo Bottura Enrico Crippa

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A C A D E M I C C O U N C I L

One was instantly aware of therelaxed and friendly atmo-sphere that characterized this

second meeting of the Academic Council,following last year’s event in Florence.And with his opening remarks PresidentPaolo Petroni emphasized this warmthand conviviality. He defined it as a si-gnificant moment for the Academy cha-racterized by the great enthusiasm thatthe Delegations demonstrated in carryingout the recently celebrated Ecumenicaldinner. The positive reception of thelatest volume of the Itineraries aboutcondiments and the large number ofmembers of the Council that were presentwere signs of their commitment andparticipation in the many subjects onthe agenda.The President also expressed his ownsatisfaction in seeing the Academy evolvethanks to the broad sharing of the ini-tiatives that have been undertaken in

line with the program he presented du-ring his candidacy. Among them wasgreater diffusion of the magazine, witha more modern and up to date style.With its expanded print run and distri-bution it will reach a larger institutionalaudience both in Italy and abroad: itssuccess has been demonstrated by thenumerous thank-you emails not onlyfrom cultural institutes, libraries, mayors,city councilors and hospitality institutesbut also from the Delegates around theworld who now have another instrumentto help spread awareness about the Aca-demy in their own territories.Petroni also reported on a recent meetingwith the Director General for CulturalAssets, who is ready to examine andembrace some specific Academy pro-posals and projects, along with otherMinisters and Government Entities. Thenhe described another successful initiative:the Newsletter that is now being sent toall Academicians. It contains recentnews, and its timely and colorful designhelp provide a context and give a faceto some of the protagonists to help allrecipients better participate the life ofthe Academy.Only five months have passed since hiselection, but other instruments havebeen deployed to increase the visibility,authority and cultural vocation of theAcademy. An excellent example is the“Franco Marenghi” Study Center, com-prised by worthy professors, journalists,writers and ambassadors in the worldof Italian gastronomy, all experts in theirfields. Among them, Paolo Petroni fo-cused on the name of Gualtiero Marchesi,emblem of modern Italian cuisine, andhow moved he was to be part of the

Academy’s Study Center. Their sense ofbelonging is apparent by the articlesthey contribute to our magazine eachmonth.The new institutional brochure consti-tutes another technique for reachingout to institutions in the various territoriesin which our Delegations operate. Hotoff the press, it illustrates our objectives,structure and activities with the goal ofincreasing the awareness and authori-tativeness of the Academy as a partnerin cultural initiatives.In order to look outward it is still neces-sary to operate with authority and co-herence internally, always allowing forindividual opinions. Petroni affirmedthat for this reason the new Code ofEthics was established, presented andsubsequently approved unanimously.This document represents the foundingvalues upon which the Academy basesall of its actions and activities. Thesevalues must be recognized and sharedby all participants in the Academy at alllevels. It constitutes yet another elementfor reinforcing the Academicians’ senseof belonging to the institution.And speaking of a sense of belonging tothe Academy, here is a brief digressionon something that took place on thenight before the Consulta meeting.Thanks to excellent organization on thepart of Pietro Fracanzani, the Delegateof Eugania-Basso Padovano, all the par-ticipants, including the regional and ter-ritorial coordinators, were gathered to-gether at a restaurant that was muchbeloved by Orio Vergani: the Antica Trat-toria Ballotta in Torreglia. The eveningtook the guests back to the roots of theAcademy. There were photographs on

The Academy’s new initiatives were introduced during the meeting in Albano Terme,and the participants shared them with great enthusiasm.

An increasingly dynamic Academy

BY SILVIA DE LORENZO

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the walls immortalizing our founder atwork behind the stove and posing withmenus containing traditional regionaldishes which, as President Petroni hasemphasized, never get old.Returning to the subject of the meeting,Secretary General and Treasurer RobertoAriani presented the Proposed 2016Budget, which he compared with the2015 preliminary budget and he explai-ned the content line by line and the va-riations between the two fiscal years.He also pointed out the criteria thatwere applied to the document that wassent to the participants before the mee-ting for their advance perusal: prudencewhen estimating expenditures and cau-tion regarding income. He concludedwith satisfaction that even during a cri-tical period the Academy managed toconsolidate its structure by increasingits membership by 400.Regarding the initiatives proposed inthe expenditure column, Paolo Petronibrought up the new Cookbook, whichthe Delegations are presenting and pro-moting in their respective territorieswith events and displays which havemet with great success on the part ofthe public which has expressed appre-ciation for content over imagery. Healso announced that the United Statesrequested an ad hoc edition.The President of the Board of Auditors,Gianni Limberti, reported that after ha-ving carefully reviewed and comparedthe 2015 Preliminary Budget and theincome an expenses for 2016, the Boardexpressed a favorable judgment. Theproposed budget was unanimously ap-proved, including the annual dues ratewhich will remain unchanged. Then the

Assembly tackled the final item on theagenda: the changes to several articlesof the ByLaws, largely owing to theadoption of the Code of Ethics. TheConsulta unanimously approved thechanges.Then it was time for individual speechesby participants, including several by Ter-ritorial Coordinators. They were notonly very pertinent and precise but alsoconcrete and contained some specificproposals. They symbolized not only adesire on their part to “construct” andcontinuously improve relations with theindividual territories, but also to bettermanage initiatives to be undertaken. Tothat end, for example, Guido Schiaroli(Territorial Coordinator for Umbria) re-quested that the magazine also be sentto institutions in those towns with fewerthan 30,000 inhabitants that host a De-legation (request accepted); Mauro Ma-gagnini (Territorial Coordinator for theMarche), in addition to speaking of therecent success of the 50th edition of theconference “Golden Verdicchio”, askedfor greater participation by the TerritorialCenters in the flow of communicationwith the President and broader accessto Academy publications in order tohave the materials at hand to spreadawareness of the Academy’s activities(principle accepted); Pier Paolo Veroni(Territorial Coordinator for Emilia) andBerardo Paradiso (Consulta member)expressed a desire for greater dialogueamong Delegates; Victor Pablo Danaproposed that new English definitionsof Academic titles (Academician, Sim-posiarca) be established with the goalof better understanding of their role;and Mario Tuccillo (Territorial Coordi-

nator for Eastern Piemonte) hopedthat the Academy would be ableto uphold its founding principleseven as it evolves.And now we arrive at the convivialdinner, which played a significantrole because it centered aroundthe dishes of the region (Orio Ver-gani would have been pleased).Organized with care and dedica-tion, the dinner was greatly enjoyedby the participants. We have already

mentioned the welcome dinner at Bal-lotta, the oldest trattoria in the Euganianhills where both a piazza and a streetare named after Orio Vergani. But thetraditions of the Veneto also pervadedthe working lunch at the Abano GrandHotel, with a selection of local appetizersincluding sardines “in saor”and a secondcourse with a fantastic mixed fish fryfrom the lagoon and Venetian style liver.For the gala dinner, which was alsowonderfully organized by the EuganiaDelegation, guests were taken to thebeautiful Bishops’ Villa in Luvigliano diTorreglia, designed in 1500 by AlviseCornaro. Today it belongs to the FAIwhich restored it and opened it to thepublic. Here the guests enjoyed an ori-ginal cup of broth seasoned with Tabascosauce followed by a rich menu basedon the cuisine of the Veneto, which wasalso enjoyed by all. At the end of each of the three convivialmeetings President Petroni congratulatedthe restaurateurs and presented themeach with the Orio Vergani medal. Andat the gala dinner, after a brief discussionof Tabasco and Worcestershire sauce inhomage to the 2015 theme, the Presidentthanked the participants and in turnDelegate Pietro Fracanzani and his Vice-Delegate Angelo Masso for their excellentorganization and their gifts commemo-rating the event, including an invaluableedition of Antonio Todaro’s Tra le pieghedelle erbe.In closing, Paolo Petroni emphasizedthe spirit of friendship and cordialitythat marked the working sessions andconvivial moments all in the name ofthe values that inspire Academic life.

SILVIA DE LORENZO

C U L T U R E A N D R E S E A R C HA C A D E M I C C O U N C I L

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S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H

F ood is a an undeniable protagonistof our times, at least when por-trayed as an object of interest on

television and the media in general: di-shes created on live TV or described indetail in magazines or online, cooks andaspiring chefs who illustrate the harmonyof taste and balance of ingredients, nu-tritionists who certify quality, expertswho make favorable pronouncements.The show is on the air and its success isguaranteed! Too often, however, thereis no trace of a foundation that servesto establish certainty or knowledge. Con-tributing to an already uncomfortablesituation are those disputes, or betterdefined “verbal brawls” that revolvearound food and diet, between propo-

nents or supporters convinced of theirown infallibility that would be more ap-propriate to a debate over soccer thanto a scientific subject that is directly re-lated to our health and wellbeing.Several years ago our Honorary PresidentGiovanni Ballarini wrote in the pages ofthis magazine: “We are living in a periodduring which the avalanche of increa-singly confusing and often contradictoryinformation, even in cuisine, is not ableto replace knowledge”. And continuingon the subject of information, in a recentEncyclical entitled “Laudato sii”, evenPope Francis expounded on the “dynamicof the media and the digital world that,when they are omnipresent do not en-courage the development of a capacity

BY MASSIMO VINCENZINIAcademician, Empoli Delegation“Franco Marenghi” Study Center

We must confront various problems with wisdom and depth of thought, and not through the veil of information that Pope Francis calls “Wasteful Noise”.

An open debate on food

The “Charter of Milan” will stand as the intangible inheritanceof Expo. Unlike the traditional universal exhibitions, the MilanExpo intends to leave a concrete memento because “safeguar-ding the future of the planet and the right of future generationsof the whole world to live a prosperous and rewarding existenceis the great challenge to the development of the twenty-first cen-tury. To understand the links between environmental sustaina-bility and fairness is essential if we care about expanding hu-man freedoms for the present and future generations”. With the

authoritative wish expressed by the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella who conceives of a collective as-set for the nation that will emerge richer but also the fruit of labor that will continue in time because “the rightto food and water can be achieved on all continents”.The Charter of Milan, underwritten by all countries that took part in the Universal Exhibition, and officiallyhanded to the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, sets a series of international objectives onthemes connected to nutrition and sustainable development. It is a commitment with the contribution of manynational and international institutions “aimed at bringing deep change to the daily behavior of individual per-sons and to the strategic choices of policies aligned with the next objectives of the millennium”.

PAGE 6

to live wisely and think profoundly. Inthis context, the great minds of the pastwould have run the risk of seeing theirknowledge suffocated by the wastefulnoise of information”. Harsh words thatconvey an unequivocal sign of deep con-cern, but also a life sentence withoutappeal: in the case of information, ourcurrent use of innovative technology istantamount to “wasteful noise”!In all honesty, however, we must reco-gnize that in a global context, the subjectof food’s greatest problem is not disin-formation (or the wasteful noise of in-formation, as accurately defined by PopeFrancis). Objectively the main priorityregarding the subject of food must beto confront and resolve problems derivingfrom behavior and a reality that areworlds apart, such as the wasting offood on the part of a large portion ofthe world’s population, and the hungerand malnutrition that are still dramati-cally persistent in an equally large portionof the population of the planet.In the face of these enormous problems,Italy seized upon the opportunity offered

by the Universal Exposition in Milan,whose theme was “To Feed the Planet”,and brought to the table over 500 expertstasked with reflection on such funda-mental questions as the right to foodand food waste, and to establish themain points upon which to focus theglobal debate. Thus the “Milan Charter”was born. This document was officiallypresented by Minister Martina April 28at the State University of Milan, 48 hoursbefore the official opening of Expo 2015.With this document, Italy - a countrythis is traditionally very sensitive andattentive to the topics inherent in food- officially put forth an internationalfood act that consists of a list of respon-sibilities and concrete undertakings thatcan be underwritten by citizens and in-stitutions of every country. The documentwas presented to United Nations Secre-tary General Ban Ki-moon. Thus theCharter proposes itself as a nontangiblecollective patrimony of the UniversalExposition and at the same time, as acontribution of major importance to thediscussion of the Objectives for Sustai-

nable Development, promoted by theUnited Nations and scheduled for No-vember 2015. At this point we should point out thatamong the final requests presented inthe Charter there is one that seems tohave come directly from the goals ofour Academy since its founding. Thetext states: “Therefore we, men and wo-men, citizens of this planet, in signingthis Milan Charter, forcefully ask gover-nments, institutions and internationalorganizations to consider food to be acultural patrimony and as such to defendit from counterfeiting and fraud, protectit from deceptions and unethical businesspractices, to value and prioritize placeof origin and freshness with transparentregulatory practices”.The debate over food, with all its impli-cations, from accurate information toimportant questions that threaten allprospects for sustainable development(both at the national and internationallevels) is officially open: Let us hopethat Culture is heard!

MASSIMO VINCENZINI

S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H

Academicians’ contributions to the magazine are notonly welcome, but essential. However Academiciansshould keep in mind some important guidelines so thattheir contributions, which are the fruit of their passionand dedication, are expeditiously published.

� Articles: it is essential that the text of articles besent via email, in MS Word format (not pdf) to the fol-lowing address: redazione@accademia1953.it

� Article length: it is important that articles are bet-ween 3,500 and 7,000 characters (including spaces);this is the best way to avoid cuts that are bothersome forboth the editors and those submitting the texts. All com-puters should be able to provide character counts..

� Each issue of the magazine is printed one month ahe-ad of the cover date so that it can be delivered to theAcademicians by that date. Those submissions that aretime sensitive should be sent in ample time.

� “From the Delegations” Section: In order to facili-tate reading, please limit articles to a maximum of2,500 characters including spaces.

� Please remember that in the “From the Delegations”section as well as elsewhere, descriptions of meetingsheld outside the territory of the Delegation or in thehomes of Academicians, unless they are associatedwith an important event, will not be published. Al-so, please do not include a list of dishes and wines.Such listing should appear on the appropriate ratingform regarding convivial meetings.

� Rating forms for convivial meetings: should be sentto the Secretariat (segreteria@accademia1953.it). Itis also important to limit remarks in the “notes and com-ments” section of the form to 800 characters (maxi-mum 1,000) spaces included in order to avoid cuts. Ra-ting forms that reach the Secretariat more than 30 daysafter the event will be discarded.

� We also request that you not submit reports on convi-vial meetings held outside the territory of the Delega-tion, or that take place in the homes of Academicians,or are otherwise not held in restaurants or public ve-nues, as they will not be published.

GUIDELINES FOR CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE MAGAZINE

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S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H

BY STELIO SMOTLAKAcademician, Muggia-Capodistria Delegation

The fermentation of grapes is a metamorphosis of content. Moments that mark the synergy between man and nature.

Saint Martin: celebrating wine,stirring life

A t Saint Martin’s time the mustbecomes wine! It is a very wellknown adage expressed in the

Venetian dialect. The celebration isheld on November 11th and traditionallyarticulates a timely event with greatsymbolic value. “The boiling of thevats” subsides to make room for themysterious whiffs of the delicious winenectar. The process of transformationof the must (the pressed grapes) intowine still is surrounded by an aura ofmystery. The whole affair is not entirelyunderstood, nor is it perfectly controlledor controllable. The fermentation ofthe grape, and not only that (one exam-ple among others: milk) is a metamor-phosis of content. The basic food be-comes prominent.The Mediterranean civilizations havealways celebrated two fundamentalevents in the life of the community:the gathering of the fruit - the grape

harvest and its transformation: themust becomes wine. These are salientmoments that tell us about the pro-ductive merger of man with nature. Itwas like that in the Christian era andbefore then in the preceding ages. Oneis reminded of the Vinalia of Romantimes when the new wine was tastedand the future harvest was propitiated.And again one goes back to the daywhen the casks were opened in oldGreece (Pitégia). Fernand Braudel re-ferred to the Mediterranean not justas “civilization, but a series of civili-zations, piled up one on top of theother” signifying the successive repla-cement within the same essential va-lues. “The swollen juicy bunches, sym-bol of prosperity, are a precious giftto man, as he is capable of favoringthe evolution of must into wine andenjoying its vital contribution”. Theprinciple of donation indeed definesthe personality of At. Martin (fromTours). Sandro Sangiorgi writes thatthe grape “contains a silent potentialdestined to evolve once it becomesmust”.What do we make then of must? Water,some sugars, some acids, and a myriadof micro elements. Luca Gardini, na-med sommelier Number One in theworld in the year 2010, in his Ency-clopedia describes six hundred com-ponents and 2,500 different aromaticsubstances! There is, however, some-thing else, what Sangiorgi calls “thefertile community of micro-organisms”:the ferments, more properly yeast, thebreath of life.Is wine a miracle of nature or an in-vention of man? One could well call it

a communion with Mother Earth!Sangiorgi goes on to say: “Wine is anecosystem that is complex and onlypartially explored, the nexus betweenaction and reaction that cannot everbe taken for granted”. Unquestionably,making wine is not a mechanical pro-cess. Wine is prodigious. It is present in allrites, including even those celebrationsthat exclude it. Wine is amazing. Itbrings an inebriated vision, as in ablind meandering. It is a spirit. Onecannot speak of wine without men-tioning spirit. A divine nectar. “Wineis God’s piss”, as goes the peasant ex-pression cited by Ulderico Bernardi. Wine as food…for body and spirit.And also a brutal potion. Sacred andprofane. Conscience and lack of con-science. Always strongly duplicitous. How can we manage it? One is remin-ded of the “sober inebriation of Am-brogius (Doctor of the Church). Invino veritas: knowledge is not free buta gift painstakingly cultivated. Finally, an interview should be recalledthat posed the question to a wine wor-ker: is wine made in the vineyard orin the cellar? The answer went some-thing like this: “It is made in the cellarbut most of all in the fields”. This an-swer is almost to be expected but it isworthy of a comment. For sure, wineis made in the vineyards, breakingone’s back (in truth, it still happens).What is needed is “applied” intelligencein order to bring the best of nature toour table, at the disposal of our wel-lbeing. Wine is perfected, however,only by the meeting with the soul thattastes it.

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S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H

F rom the French aperitif : to wit,those drinks that make it easyon your spleen. Today, however,

we call aperitifs a few alcoholic sti-mulants that are supposed to stimulateour appetite. Keep in mind that a he-althy stomach does not require tonicsor cordials; if it is full, water, swimmingand diet are the best prescriptions, towhich one should add: the heart ishappy when it is possible. Alfredo Pan-zini commented on the word aperitifin the Modern Dictionary devoted tothose words that are not found in com-mon dictionaries. He wrote that bet-ween 1905 and 1935 picking up allthe new words, no matter their origin

or nature, “floating” around the mo-dern Italian language and ignored byother dictionaries. The term originatesin late Latin with the term aperitivus,meaning “opening”, that was absorbedby the French aperitif. Its history is indeed ancient: in thefifth century B.C. the Greek physicianHippocrates advised people who suf-fered from poor appetite to drink thevinum hippocraticum, a sweet whitewine that contained macerated flowersof absinth, rue and burning bush. TheRomans drank it to prepare their sto-machs for the repast by mixing aro-matized wine and honey, a formulathey had acquired from the Greeks,

BY ANTONIETTA STROILIAcademician, Udine Delegation

It should mark the moment of the meeting among people who wish to talk, leading toa serene state of mind and good disposition toward the food that will be coming.

It’s time for an aperitivo

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S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H

and by adding rose petals; whenrosemary and sage were also ad-ded, they called it vinum absin-thiatum to improve the taste. During the Middle Ages it wasdecided that bitter substanceswere the most appropriate forstimulating both a better appetiteand good digestion, starting witha good wine base and addingherbs, roots, leaves, citrus andspices. The taste of the liquorwas thus modified with choicesand doses of preparation thatwere kept secret by the distillers. Commerce with the East and thediscovery of new worlds encou-raged the use of essences, usingaromatic herbs to transform themedicinal into a pleasant drink.The Italian aperitif was not in-tended just for medicinal use. Itcame to life in Turin in 1796 in a bou-tique of wines and liquors owned byArturo Benedetto Carpano. He hadthe brilliant idea of preparing ver-mouth, from the German Wermut orabsinthe, by using as a base a wine,Moscato d’Asti, with the scent of herbsand spices, plus absinthe as an ingre-dient. King Victor Emmanuel II enjoyedit and called it “vermouth of aristocracyand legality”. Garibaldi loved it. Otherenthusiastic consumers were Cavour,Verdi and Giacosa. Ottavio Carpanotook over the business and found away to merchandize the product in1870 as Punt e Mes. The baptismalname was due to a stock exchangeagent who ordered the drink by callingout the points that he won or lost. Traditionally, Turin considers itself asthe capital of aperitif. Piedmont origi-nated a score of similar products thatare still sold, even though some areno longer owned by Italians. Milanboasts important labels and so do Pa-dua and other centers. Leaving aside the story of the name,which has nothing in common withthe firm that produces vermouth, spe-cial mention is due to the Dry Martini,an international brand that falls underthe category of aperitif, although it is

quite different from the traditionalproducts and is popular in the countriesof Northern Europe and North Ame-rica. The Dry Martini marries dry ver-mouth with an alcoholic distillate, gin.Our Paolo Monelli was fond of it,Ernest Hemingway even more so. Theyhad their own formulas in which thequantity of gin prevails over that ofvermouth that at times is held to afew drops. Filippo Tommaso Marinetti,the futurist, called it “polydrink” (po-libibita) and “inventina”, a genericname that signifies slightly inebriatingdrinks that are helpful in generatingideas.A good Italian aperitif should not behighly alcoholic or too sapid, lest itinfluence the taste thus spoiling whatis coming with dinner that quite oftenbegins with delicate flavors. At times when professional categorieskept separate, professionals, army of-ficers, state supervisors and industria-lists, all the way to employees andworkers, had their own meeting venuesand places of social aggregation fortheir ritual before dinner in a certaincafé or bar of the city, each of themknow for its “americano” (that wasthe generic name). The differenceswere represented by the choice of the

starting wine and the bitter thatwas used to give it a particularscent. In another part of Italy - Friuli -Venezia Giulia and indeed the en-tire Veneto region - the most po-pular aperitif, well appreciatedand drunk by the people, is thespritz (apparently the name comesfor the German-Austrian “spritzen”(squirting) that is made by addingwater to the wine, a habit of thesoldiers of the Hapsburg empireposted around Venice). With limited alcohol, the aperitifneeds as a base a good wine, whiteand dry. In this regard, we fearno competition because Venetianwines are excellent and most ofall they lend themselves to wate-ring with seltzer, with the additionof a lemon peel or a few drops of

bitter that do not alter its characteri-stics. There was a time in Friuli, and to someextent this is still the case, when thechoice made by men leaned towardthe “tajut blanc”, a glass of pure whitewine that worked as a breakfast offeredby the ostarias, or taverns, with an in-vitation to drink a second glass. The“tajut”, simple, genuine and grape co-lored, is now drunk by the gentler sexas a token of parity and pleasure, andis served by bars as well. It has evolvedand is gentler, better known now asprosecco, a wine that has scored greatsuccess.The classic aperitifs have been replacedby the younger crowd with drinks con-taining less alcohol (alco-pop) or bybinge drinking, a mixture of beverageswith foreign names that do not belongto Italian tradition or history, and donot represent an evolution of taste ora culture of drink. Most of all, the hour of the aperitifshould mark the moment for a meetingof people who have something to sayto each other, leading to a serene stateof mind, that is appropriate to betterappreciating and enjoying the foodthat is about to follow.

ANTONIETTA STROILI

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S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H

T he depiction of food in paintingis usually associated with stilllife, a pictorial genre that in-

cludes the inanimate world of objectsbut also fruit, flowers, game and fish,as we can see from the numerous pain-tings of “sumptuous tables” by the ar-tists of the Low Countries in the 1600s.And indeed, starting from the secondhalf of the 16th century food abandonedthe marginal role it had played in thepainting of the preceding centuries,

which had been almost exclusively do-minated by religious and mythologicaliconography, and became a protagonistof painting.The opulence of the “sumptuous table”created by Floris van Schooten, PieterClaesz and other Dutch masters of stilllife reflected the easy lifestyle of a bour-geois Protestant society that found thesource of its wealth in commerce. Thisis why these still lives, in which the ex-traordinary ability of these virtuous il-

lustrators reached stag-gering heights, containimages of rare and pre-cious foods, ostenta-tiously displayed uponthe table, often inclu-ding oysters, mollusksand fish.It would be a mistake,however, to see thesepaintings as purely mi-metic, as they also con-tain hidden allusionsand symbols that caneasily be overlooked atfirst glance. The imageof fish, for example,often appears as a sym-bol of Christ in pain-tings and mosaics, andas portrayed in depic-tions of The Last Sup-per. In the mosaic ofThe Last Supper that ishoused in the churchof Sant’Apollinare Nuo-vo in Ravenna (early6th century) the Eucha-ristic meal is represen-ted solely by seven loa-

BY ALDO ANDREOLOAcademician, Venice Delegation

Fish has inspired some extraordinary artwork, but was still considered an unusual subject for artists of all eras.

Food and painting

PAGE 11

ves of bread and two large fish that lieat the center of the table.The 2nd century B.C. floor mosaic withfish that came from the so-called Houseof the Faun in Pompeii and is nowhoused in the National ArcheologicalMuseum of Naples is instead one ofthe most extraordinary examples ofillusionary realism of which we havemany pictorial examples in the frescoesof Pompeii and the area around Vesu-vius. This mosaic featuring an octopusbattling with a lobster amid a multitudeof other fish, crustaceans and mollusks(we can recognize a gilthead, spottedbass, mullet, a skate and a scorpionfish), actually is every bit as good interms of mimetic value as the famousstill lives of the (presumed) villa ofPoppea a Oplontis, the original antelitteram trompe-l’oeil.Returning to the initial subject of thisbrief essay, we cannot forget to mentiona work that is completely anomalousto the painting of the 1500s but stillvery picturesque, by an artist whopainted splendid still lives but stilldoes not number among the betterknown painters of that artistic genre.We are speaking of Giuseppe Arcim-boldi, known simply as Arcimboldo,the creator of the bizarre anthropo-morphic heads composed of flowers,

fruit, vegetables and animals that soenchanted the European royalty andaristocracy of the era. Even modernart historians have fallen victim to thefascination of these paintings in whichthey have found surprising precursorsof surrealism. Born in Milan in 1527 (the date is notcertain), after having worked with hisfather, who was also a painter, in theDuomo of Milan, Arcimboldo was hiredby the Royal Court of Vienna in 1562as portrait copyist. In Prague he becamethe favorite painter of Emperor Ru-dolph II.One of his most emblematic works iscertainly Water, which was part of theFour Elements series: This painting de-picts a hideous face composed of fish,mollusks and crustaceans, in which aseashell becomes an ear embellishedwith a splendid teardrop pearl; ashrimp becomes an eyebrow and asmall shark provides the teeth of therepulsive mouth of this incredible cha-racter. And even coral becomes a sortof crown set jauntily atop the monster’shead. A monster that Rudolph II jea-lously guarded, along with other stran-ge objects and artifacts, in his astoni-shing Wunderkammer (Chamber ofWonders).Of a totally different nature we have

the work of Jean-Siméon Chardin, an18th century French painter. His stilllives depict the silent world with apoetic intensity that places him alon-gside the great painters of the 1700s. One of his most famous paintings, TheSkate (1726?) housed at the Louvrein Paris, consistently fascinated otherartists, including Cézanne, Matisseand Soutine who never tired of copyingor taking inspiration from it. The workis truly a bravura piece that can holdits own with the greatest still lives ofthe Dutch Masters of the 17th century.The composition develops on two pla-nes: the horizontal (the table, wherecooking utensils, oysters and fish arescattered with studied disorganization)and the vertical (the wall, upon whichthe skate hangs - the focal point ofthe work). Chardin even allowed him-self an unedited aside - a cat (thistime alive) that eyes the tempting oy-sters on the table with evident interest.Still, it is the flattened and bloodyskate that bewitched writers such asDiderot and Proust. They asked them-selves how such a “disgusting” subjectcould transform itself into an imageof sublime beauty simply by the handof the artist.I could continue to name many exam-ples but our brief look at some extra-ordinary, unusual and genuine ma-sterpieces inspired by fish, and paintingby artists of every era must end here.I will address another study on theartistic work from the 19th century topresent day in another specific essay.

ALDO ANDREOLO

S O M M A R I OC U L T U R E & R E S E A R C H