Slow Food presidia 2020: an overview

The year of the pandemic saw the entry of eight new Slow Food presidia into the national list that gathers foods and eating practices to be preserved, enhanced, and promoted to the public, to protect biodiversity – both cultural and related to the wealth of animal and plant species that surround us.
Slow Food means sustainability, foresight in considering the importance of a varied and balanced diet for our well-being: it means defending endangered specialties from the homogenization to which the market is subject, also through education and increasing consumer awareness.

The programmatic lines of the Slow Food Association for 2021-2025 aim to highlight the importance of having access to “good, clean, and fair” food, which does not arise from the indiscriminate exploitation of the land and its resources but from respecting the rhythms of Mother Nature, moving away from waste and the “fast life” promoted by consumerism.

The symbols of this battle: the Slow Food presidia 2020

The symbolic products of the principles listed above are precisely the Slow Food presidia, over 350 in total just in the Italian territory: among them, we find the most “recently” added to the list which is continuously updated.

Slow Food Presidia 2020 - Campania

A ecotype from Campania, the Fagiolo di Gorga is a legume that is said to have pleased Queen Maria Carolina of Austria, the ruler of Naples, who praised its sweetness. Small and white, the bean we are talking about has a delicate flavor and excellent digestibility, is quick to cook, and is already featured in a typical recipe, that of “ciccimmaretati” (a soup prepared in Cilento with various legumes: this dish even has its own festival in August!).

Without moving to another region, we find in Campania the Slow Food presidium of Pecorino di Carmasciano, made from the milk of two different species of sheep, the Laticauda and the Bagnolese: we are in a small grazing area in the Valle d’Ansanto, characterized by a peculiar presence of sulfurous exhalations. It is indeed the sulfur that flavors the milk from which, after an optimal aging of 12 months, this delicious pecorino is obtained, produced from February to July.

Finally, from Campania comes the cipolla di Airola, handpicked and intended to delicately flavor salads or create a characteristic pasta dressing.

Slow Food Presidia 2020 – Emilia Romagna

Although they correspond to a single item in the 2020 presidia list, the ancient Reggiano melons are actually an entire category of cucurbits that includes netted melons like the ramparino, smooth melons like the rospo, and winter melons like the Santa Vittoria banana melon, which are unobtainable in large-scale distribution and unsuitable for long shelf life. Alongside them, among the recent Romagnolo presidia added to the list, we also find the hollow peach, also known as “pesca di Massa Lombarda,” which is harvested from mid-August to mid-September.

Slow Food Presidia 2020 – Lombardy, Lazio, Umbria

In addition to the cipolla di Airola, the list of Slow Food presidia also includes the red onion of Breme, a huge and very sweet variety actually also cultivated in Piedmont: cultivated by the Benedictine monks of the low Lomellina, it is used raw or cooked, also to obtain compotes, jams, and mustards.

Moving to Tivoli, we find the corna grape, which has characterized the Tiburtino landscape since Roman times; the presidium of the Pizzutello grape also includes the cultivation techniques for this variety, linked to the typical trellis system with wooden posts, which over time have been replaced by iron and concrete structures much less compatible both with the plants and the landscape.

Finally, the last presidium we will talk about is of Umbrian origin: it is the buckwheat of the Vanerina, naturally gluten-free and cultivated by only three producers.