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The Slow Food Movement is one of asthetics, taste and tradition – an appeal to both your inner bonvivant and your eco-consciousness. In 1986, Carlo Petrini founded the Slow Food Movement out of protest against a McDonalds opening in Rome, Italy. What developed was Slow Food, an international organization with over 100,000 members in 132 countries the non-profit strives to change the way we think about food and works towards protecting and preserving food traditions from the adverse effects of fast food and agricultural industrialization. Slow Food educates people from across the globe about how local cuisines are rooted deeply in their culture, and creates awareness about the effects that food choices have on the environment. By teaching people where there food is grown and how it should taste in an ecologically and economically sustainable manner, Slow Food aims to attract people from all walks of life and is a global grassroots movement.
Slow Food USA was formed in 1989 with its first office in New York City. Today there are 170 chapters in more than forty states across America, engaging in activities such as promoting taste education, defending and advocating sustainability and biodiversity, and building food communities. By focussing on a farmer's commitment to their land, and the culinary practices that have yielded great results in taste, Slow Food USA aims to protect and promote the many food traditions of America from fast food and supermarket homogenization. The future of this organization and its ability to transform into a grassroots movement, lies with the youth of America, so it's not surprising that Josh Viretel, the 31-year old Brooklynite responsible for bringing sustainable food to Yale's dining halls, is at Slow Food USA's helm. "Food is a common language and a universal right. Good, clean, fair food can no longer be considered a privilege; we must acknowledge it as a right,” a remarked last year in a Slow Foods USA press release.
For all you New Yorkers anxious to join the movment, Slow Food NYC is a very active arm of the international gastronomic organization. Take class at Slow U, where you'll sample sustainable wines and taste fair trade treats. Or stop by the Harvest Home Youth Farm in East Harlem where local students staff a farmstand chock full of locally grown goods. And, their Snail of Approval web site has a detailed list of New York City loacales that will satisfy your palate and your politics from restaurants to bars, farmstands to markets.
About the Author
Unni Krishnan Nair was born in Silver Spring Maryland, and grew up in New York City and in India. He studied Computer Engineering in India and after his work with computers had him succumb to an unrepairable burn-out, he began to read philosophy and graduated from Columbia University. Unni aspires to write and this aspiration has quietly and mysteriously nurtured him into an entrepreneur.
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