From the field… to the table: the role of chefs in the relationship between producers and consumers

After all, the approach of Slow Food chefs is no more a niche, but a philosophy embraced by more and more consumers because is capable of responding to the profound changes that taking place in the world. In fact, catering has changed in its global dimension, and Slow Food’s vision is certainly not a passing trend, on the contrary, it has made the chef’s bearers of innovation, to the point of making it a tradition. In a context that allows the redefinition of a model to reinterpret it in the light of contemporaneity. The dimension of transformation, as mentioned, is not the only one, because telling and explaining what is in the territories from which the products come has become fundamental, and so chefs rediscover themselves, like winemakers, the engine of the territories, so much so that today a restaurant or a tavern are much more, they are energy to trigger the element of the community, creating together with customers and producers a dimension that is recognized in this model.
“That of Rifugio Maraza (in Trentino, ed) is a project born 15 years ago, and now we have closed the circle, coming to find only raw materials and local producers, and networking with other chefs to optimize everyone’s work and energy. Furthermore, we have created a social project for the recovery of ancient grains and vegetables grown on three hectares, managed by disabled guys, giving a social role to our work. Thus, food is different, because I know where it comes from and who produces it, from extraordinary guys who work in the open air”, tells Paolo Betti, from “Rifugio Maranza”. “Even at the farm level, the management of animals is free, but the most important aspect for me is to bring my ideas, comparing myself with colleagues in four-handed dinners, so as to do new experiences and to have more points of view, and obviously very good chefs, in Italy and abroad, where I found beautiful traditional experiences”.
A huge challenge for the contemporary world is that of reducing meat consumption because its impact on the agricultural supply chain is enormous. In this sense, meat has often been criminalized, but sustainable farming is possible, based on grazing and small numbers, and that guarantees animals a worthy treatment and life, making breeding a sustainable and ethical supply chain. Grazing, speaking of bovine, adds important nutrients, but it is difficult to find meat raised in this way, especially in a Western world used to eating too much meat. “Thus, the world of consumers become polaridìzed, between vegans and who cares, but in between, there may be a different model made up of complicated choices”, says Roberto Crocenzi from “La Taverna di Montisi”. Starting from an assumption, that is “there is nothing to which more attention should be paid that to itself and its body. And, consequently, to food. “Food is my medicine”, said Hippocrates, and it is true. We have to use the best fuel there is. Among the producers and the masses of consumers, there are the cooks, those who come to us are looking for an experience, no matter whether they eat bread and onion or a 7-course menu. Food and wine are tools with which we can communicate through the mediation of conscious cooks, producers and consumers. The meat supply chain that we find in the supermarket is repulsive, I want to be sure that an animal, before being killed to become meat, has lived a good life. Here comes the search for companies that raise animals in an ethically correct way, because we have always been omnivores, but it is right that we respect the life cycle of animals and their nature, raising them in freedom and letting them feed on what they find”, continues Roberto Crocenzi.
Luca Doro in its “Pizzeria Doro Gourmet”, instead, has created with its customers “a relationship of empathy based on the construction of a sustainable supply chain, that come from grains and cereals and reaches our pizzas, with many Slow Food presidia, of farmers with whom we started a project: “The footprint”. The goal is to network with producers, who have suffered more in these two years of the pandemic. We have adopted uncultivated land and entire garrisons, cultivating forgotten grains and bringing abandoned olive groves back into production. We want our producers to become pioneers among the people because the consumer searches an emotion from us”, concludes the pizza chef and baker from Campania.