slow food nations 155front: arches, bucket, or cowboy hat. That’s the answer to the question,
“Where did it come from?”
Of course that’s not the whole story. We have our New En gland clam
chowder, Louisiana gumbo, southern collards and black- eyed peas, all re-
gionally specific. But together they don’t add up to any amalgamated
themes or national guidelines for enjoying what grows near us. The food
cultures of other geographically diverse nations are not really one thing
either; Italy is particularly famous for its many distinct regional special-
ties. But still that whole country manages to export a cuisine that is recog-
nizably “Italian,” unified by some basic ingredients (i.e. pasta), and an
intrinsic attitude. We recognize the origins of other countries’ meals when
we see them, somehow sensing their spirit: Mama mia! Bon appétit. Pass
the salsa.
If you ask a person from Italy, India, Mexico, Japan, or Sweden what
food the United States has exported to them, they will all give the same
answer, and it starts with a Mc. And it must be said, they’re swallowing it.
Processed food consumption is on the rise worldwide, proportional to
growing affluence. French metro stations are plastered with ads for con-
venience foods. On a recent trip there I queried audiences about the dan-
ger of France losing its traditional foodways, and found them evenly
divided between “Never!” and “Definitely!” Working women my age and
younger confessed to giving in to convenience, even though (as they put
it) they knew better. They informed me that even the national culinary
institute was going soft, having just announced that its chicken courses
would no longer begin with “Feathers, Feet, and Viscera 101.” A fl utter of
conversation ran through the crowd over this point, a major recent con-
troversy that had created radio call- in riots. I got an inkling that “giving in
to convenience” means something different on that side of the pond. But
still, these are real signs of change. Plenty of Parisians visit “MacDo” ev-
ery day, even though it’s probably not the same customers going back ev-
ery day. They’re in for the novelty, not the food value.
We are all, I suppose, dazzled by the idea of things other people will
eat. There on the Montreal Chinatown sidewalk we stopped to admire
what must have been twenty- fi ve- pound fish chasing each other’s tails in
slow motion in a half barrel of water. Lily and my young nieces inspected