Mangiamo

Mangiamo (Italian meaning, time to eat)

It seems these days that too many American families have forgotten the importance of sharing a meal together. More and more often, busy Americans are bypassing a healthy sit-down meal for a take-out Whopper at Burger King. According to "The Omnivores Dilemma," by Michael Pollan, ninteen percent of American meals are eaten in the car and one in three American children eat fast food everyday. This new trend is detrimental to physical health as well as social health. People tend to eat healthier and more balanced meals when sitting in a more formal setting, or even better at their own kitchen table. Eating meals with family members or friends is also very important and necessary to cultivating good relationships, building trust and letting out emotions and feelings. A quick stop at a greasy fast food joint contains minimal nutritional benefits and human interaction. In my opinion we should be more like the Europeans, in particular my family in Paderno, Italy.

Lunchtime is the big, long meal for Italians. For a couple hours in the middle of the day stores close, business firms take a break, children get to come home, and the whole family enjoys a home cooked lunch together.

Right when my relatives find out that my mom, dad, sister and I are coming to Italy for a visit, they begin thinking about where to bring us for our family lunch. Each time we go to Italy they organize one lunch where all the relatives are invited. Typically we go to a place in the hills that smells of cows and manure. The reason it smells this way is because all the slaughter animals are kept right there on the farm next to the family owned restaurant. Also on the farm there are freshly grown vegetables and grains. These fresh, extremely local ingredients make for a delicious meal.

In Ozeki’s, All Over Creation, a group protests in a local supermarket about the extra, un-natural hormones and chemicals added to perfectly good meat and vegetables in order to enhance their size or prolong their shelf life. Most people are completely ignorant to the fact that the “pure” vegetables they commonly eat, usually aren’t quite as pure as they believe them to be. It is a lot better for ones health to eat completely pure, fresh, un-processed food products. These are the kind of products we receive at the family owned Italian restaurants in the hills. Pure, fresh and delicious.

We sit down with about thirty of my relatives and are presented with wine, usually made by my great-uncle, Berto. There are also big pieces of freshly baked bread and thin bread sticks scattered around the table cloth. Our first course is an anti-pasti for example, proccuitto e melone. This is a light, fresh way to warm-up our stomach and taste-buds for the rest of the courses. The second course is a pasta dish. A typical pasta dish could be anything from hand made pasta with a veal tomato sauce, to a soft, cheesy lasagna. After this comes the meat. In this course we are offered breaded chicken cutlets, steak, veal, pork, and even cow tongue. You are encouraged to choose any combination of meat you would like. I learned however, that if you don’t say anything to stop the server, they will pile your plate with every option of meat. This past year when I went to Italy, I failed to say ”basta”, or stop, and they served me more meat than I consume in a week. The meat course comes with potatoes (usually French fries) and lots of vegetables.

After we are completely filled up, we are offered an Italian café and dessert. The dessert course is completely optional and generally only half the group orders it. Though I usually skip the dessert, I always have a little cup of thick, strong, pungent espresso; a great way to finish up a large meal.

Now, I have been focusing a lot on the food at this typical lunch, but thus far I have not mentioned the interesting social interactions that occur. First off, even though there are thirty of us, there is only one long table. The kids sit at the end, so that when they get antsy after a couple courses they can run and play in the playground near by. The conversational part of the meal between the adults is very interesting. There is a buzz surrounding our group of about ten different conversations at once. Most are in Italian, but a couple conversations are in English as well. It is fun to listen in to all the different conversations and learn about the local gossip. Over the course of the lunch I start to pick up words and general meanings from the “sing-songy” Italian language.

At the end of the meal, we have a good-bye session that lasts around a half an hour, where everyone double kisses and hugs one another. This shows caring and compassion and is a fine way to end the meal.

We return home feeling socially and physically satisfied and hop in the hotel bed or couch for a very needed afternoon cat nap.