Eataly

I recently had the good fortune to visit the Italian food emporium Eataly in New York.  The original store is in Torino, where I did my jr year abroad, so I knew of the store for a while and I couldn't wait to try the American store, being run by the Batali-Bastianich team.  There is a roof-top beer garden with home brewed beers by Sam Calagione's Dog Fish Head brewery.  There are 3 restaurants and a huge food store, with butchers, fish, a wine store and a school.  There is a great cafe with pastries and gelato in the front.  It is a fantastic place that everyone who loves food should visit.

It got me thinking about Italy and the way real Italians eat.  There is an Italian paradox as well as a French one, you have to wonder how Italians eat pasta and bread all day and don't get fat.  We have good family friends who live in Rome and Umbria and they recently visited us for a month.  I had the chance to see their eating habits up close and it was very educational.

They eat three full meals a day.  They sit down at the table and eat slowly, they enjoy their food.  They don't read or text or watch tv when they eat.  I don't think an Italian has ever eaten in the car.  They eat everything, but they also cook everything, they don't buy prepared or processed food.  Everything is whole and home cooked.  They rarely eat out but when they do, they go to good restaurants and enjoy it.  They aren't constantly stopping for a coffee.  They think our constant stopping at Dunks and Starbucks is ridiculous.  They don't eat between meals at all.  They don't snack, they don't feel the need to crunch on  something or have something to sip on ALL DAY LONG.  They don't drink water/tea/soda all day.  They use little or no garlic.  They eat small portions.  When  I say small, I don't mean tiny, I mean normal portions, not huge american ones.  They eat sugar, dairy and meat, but it is all whole and home made, nothing is processed.  They have a short espresso every day after lunch and enjoy their conversation.  I ate a bowl of miso soup one day at 11am because I had breakfast at 7 and I was starving and they looked at me like I was nuts.  They don't eat a half pound of pasta per person like we do in Italian restaurants.  They cook one pound for 5 adults and that's it.  They don't have a cheat day or go out on cocktail benders because they eat all kinds of foods and drink wine every day so they don't feel deprived at the end of the week.

This is somewhat how my grandparents ate (minus the wine and espresso)  and is how my mother cooked dinner at night when I was a kid and is what she does when she has dinner parties now.  My husband wants me to "cook lite" and make sandwiches for dinner and it is hard for me to wrap my brain around that.  I'm still trying to bridge the gap between "Italy Italian" ways of eating and making simple food for my family.  Maybe we just need to move to Italy so my husband and kids come home for lunch every day and there are no chicken nuggets and frozen waffles at the grocery store and we have to eat pasta and a little bistecca for lunch.