Bottura gives his blessing to the Food Act

I believe the best comment to the Collaboration protocol for the valorisation of high quality Italian cuisine abroad, which was signed last Tuesday at Farnesina in Rome, arrived from Massimo Bottura, who has fought like a lion to get here and then was absent on 15th March because he was stuck in bed on the most important day, a baton which Carlo Cracco brilliantly took: «I believe that before speaking, you should know! In my opinion the best approach would be: better late than never». Exactly: at last.

All this refers to the critics of those who put their interests before a more global vision of the Italian restaurant industry, those who mind their own business and never think that everything could be more powerful if there’d be at least a little cohesion, the intention and interest in confronting one another, be constructive for the future, creating a dialogue even with government and administrators. Italian cuisine should not stop on the doorstep of one’s restaurant, but will go beyond all those who are today’s protagonists, including Gianfranco Vissani who last week, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, kept on repeating that it’s just a waste of time, but then took pictures with ministers and Italian emblems. He may be talented in the kitchen, but he certainly lacks coherence.

I in the first place know well that everything on this planet could be improved, still it’s important that an idea, presented in March 2015 to the Ministry of Agriculture and discussed in July at Expo, gradually got five ministries involved at different levels, the three that signed the protocol, Foreign Affairs, Agriculture and Education, that is to say Paolo Gentiloni, Maurizio Martina and Stefania Giannini, plus those of culture and economic development. For sure this effort is very little Italian and perhaps it is for this reason that the absent and the selfish find it hard to understand its scope. They’re not used to seeing many people acting as a group, going much further than the single starred chef used as something shiny to show off.

Still, it would be enough just to look at the French, as well as the Peruvian, Scandinavian, Spanish, Australian, Thai, Japanese people, basically everyone, to understand what works in terms of group and propaganda. Without getting too far from the old continent, on 21st March, that is to say now, our cousins are once again celebrating the universal grandeur of their cuisine. I quote the invitation received by many Italian restaurateurs: «This coming 21st March for the second time France organises a global culinary event called Goût de France/Good France. Over 1000 chefs from 5 continents will pay homage to French cuisine and its values of conviviality. From fine dining restaurants to high quality bistros, chefs from all over the world are invited to participate in this big celebration. Last year Italy was the country with the largest number of chefs in the world, participating with 100 restaurants».

Yes, that’s right: last year 100 and this time 70 Italian chefs will create an event for their clients, something the French would never do for us, to praise all the good things another country has to offer. Though it is right to acknowledge someone else’s merits, even so as to draw the right stimuli to improve, were I among those criticising the Food Act I would be much more outraged by this than by some ministers from our government finally thinking about Italian cuisine abroad. But perhaps this is the real problem: the fact they’ve decided to do something, for instance the Week of Italian Cuisine around the World at the end of November while for decades nothing was done.