ROAST BREAKFAST – BOROUGH MARKET
1ST DECEMBER 2006

I had a lovely morning recently at the Slow Food UK breakfast and heard Carlo Petrini speak. He was so passionate about the Slow Food movement and even though he was speaking in Italian and his words translated by his interpreter, the impact was not lost. His eyes were vibrant and he threw his arms into the air with such gusto to emphasize the importance of his words. But I do wonder though if it really is possible to stem the use of these GM crops and seeds, also to change the ways of the modern world and embrace a ‘slower’ more traditional way of living. Carlo believes so and he emphasized the importance of this by his belief in educating children at a young age and following on with this message into schools and also by offering courses at universities. To encourage eating together as families and learning to enjoy producing, gathering and eating one’s food rather than looking upon it solely as ‘fuel’ to keep us going as we race about our daily lives.

He also said that assistance should be given to the producers ie the farmers and fishermen by governments allowing them to grow and gather their foods fairly and in the traditional ways with respect for the planet. He felt that the organisation shouldn’t be elitist with the idea that good food should cost more and therefore be available to the ‘more wealthy’ sector of the population – it was important for everyone to have the opportunity to eat well and to understand the importance of this for their well being. Also that the fast modern ways were slowly destroying the land and seas and by default ourselves…

Anyways it was all good stuff and Iistening to him I think many people in the room were inspired by his words. I did have an opportunity to say a quick hello. He seemed a very warm and genuine man and was interested to hear that I came from Cornwall. Maybe, he may come to one of our events one day, who knows?

Afterwards I spent a few happy hours trawling the stalls in Borough Market and sampling lots of delicious goodies. I came away with some tasty walnut bread, a rye and sunflower loaf, two large bottles of hand pressed organic olive oil, some beautiful cheeses from a most inspiring young Italian who sourced his cheeses from a farmer who lived in the foothills around Turin. Each summer the farmer would take his sheep to the rich pastures there (as this made the sheep’s milk very rich, which in turn added to the flavour of his cheese.) The cheese tasted absolutely delicious! It was very expensive but worth every penny as you can only buy it at his stall and I think in Turin. I don’t mean that it was delicious because of this but because of the trouble taken by the farmer to get the taste just so!!!

I also bought some wild rocket, bunches of fresh herbs, local fruits, jams and chutnies, bunches of fresh chillies, a big bag of wild organic mushrooms of all shapes and sizes. The mushrooms smelled wonderful and had such magnificent colours! The list of goodies was endless and my arms ached I had so much to carry home. I have a beautiful large piece of Cumerland pork to sample tomorrow too and spent ages listening to the butcher as he explained about how the pigs were reared.

I even sampled fresh clams and had ½ dozen oysters to boot! Oh and I almost forgot the raspberry beer too that I downed with gusto at the pub.

It was heaven! You would have loved it… it was as good as the Italian markets I visited in Tuscan recently. There was every conceivable product you could think of ranging from wines, to fish, to game, to well, just everything!!! I can’t wait to go back again. I just wish we had markets like this in Cornwall where you could just source every product in order to cook a meal. That is what I think we lack here - a really good traditional market like this where you can buy any food you wish! Just imagine, wouldn’t it be lovely?? I think we have some good farm shops on the North coast and we are getting more little markets and shops setting up here but we still have a long way to go to beat the supermarkets and fast food movement…..

I was in seventh heaven with it all and was almost overwhelmed with the vibrant colours, the lovely smells and the freshness of the foods. This is what ‘real living’ is all about!!!

Helen Hatcher
Slow Food Cornwall