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Let Don Genova show you how to eat, direct from Italy | Straight.com
28/04/2008 09:03 AM
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After a year of study in Italy, food journalist Don Genova will share his gastronomic gain
over a series of food-culture classes in Vancouver.
April 24, 2008
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Once upon a time, before culinary writers, bloggers, and Web sites existed,
people learned about food firsthand. Travellers returned from exotic lands with
strange seeds and spices. Aspiring chefs refined their techniques by watching
not Gordon Ramsay but their elders. Home cooks picked up tips from Mom. So in
a way, Don Genova, food journalist and educator, is heir to a long tradition that
began when one Stone Ager said to another, “You know, if you brush some sap
from that tree over there on your T. rex T-bone, supper will really rock.”
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Perhaps not touching on T-bones but covering almost everything else edible,
Genova will be sharing his gastronomic knowledge at a series of Food Culture
classes, May 5 to June 30 at Barbara-Jo’s Books to Cooks (1740 West 2nd
Avenue). He developed the content during close to a year of study that led to his
gaining a master’s degree in food culture in 2007 from the University of
Gastronomic Sciences, in Colorno, Italy. “One goal of going to school was to get
a deeper background,” he says over coffee, describing how the course combined
classroom study, research trips, and a two-month internship during which he
worked on the food-culture course.
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While he was still in Italy, Genova says, the University of Victoria contacted him,
interested in developing a minor or a continuing-studies certificate in sustainable
gastronomy. He taught the resulting course this past February and March.
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The classes he took meant exposure to instructors from all over the world. “We
learned some pretty obscure stuff—why so many French restaurants ended up
on one particular street in Belgium in the 19th century, about branding of
products, about tradition that’s so apparent in Europe and not apparent here.”
Opting to live in Colorno rather than livelier Parma, 20 kilometres away, also
gave him more face time with visiting professors like Corby Kummer, food editor
at the Atlantic Monthly.
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“Field trips were the highlight,” Genova says, describing a stay on Crete, where
he watched goats being milked and saw phyllo pastry made from scratch. A visit
to Spain involved learning about sausage and cheese production, and a session
with molecular gastronomist Ferran Adrià of El Bulli. France was Burgundy, more
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As for producers of prosciutto and Parmigiano, they were right in Genova’s
Italian neighbourhood. Getting up close and personal with the sources, origins,
and entire cycle of authentic European food has given Genova a far broader
perspective on what’s happening back home in Canada. “Part of what I talk
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Let Don Genova show you how to eat, direct from Italy | Straight.com
28/04/2008 09:03 AM
perspective on what’s happening back home in Canada. “Part of what I talk
about [in the lectures] is food security,” he says, citing Barcelona, which “puts
great stock in its public markets, which are administered by the city but run by the
stall holders”.
The founders of the University of Gastronomic Sciences are Slow Food and the
regional governments of Emilia-Romagna and Piedmont, so it’s fitting that the
first session of Genova’s course focuses on food culture and the Slow Food
movement, and that the guest speaker is Slow Food Vancouver president
Christina Beaudoins. Next up is olives. “We’ll taste four or five olive oils, and
different kinds of olives,” Genova says, describing how he likes to heat olives
with rosemary, thyme, and orange and lemon peel. Yes, there may be a cooking
demo. For a session entitled Cheese and Terroir, he and Allison Spurrell of Les
Amis du Fromage will delve into history and production. Feasting, Fasting and
Wine takes participants on a trip from the Middle Ages to modern times. Bruce
Swift of Swift Aquaculture, who practises a closed-cycle polyculture involving
coho salmon and wasabi in Agassiz, joins Genova for a session called
Sustainable Seafood.
This series of classes brings home how deeply Vancouver’s food culture has
evolved in recent years, with Oyama Sausage Company’s Jan van der Lieck
presenting samples of his charcuterie against the wider context of Genova’s
photos and video of Italian Parma ham and culatello di Zibello production. A
Food Security lecture questions whether we can, in fact, find it locally, regionally,
or even nationally, with input from Devorah Kahn, food-policy coordinator for the
City of Vancouver. The series concludes with Food and the Media, which looks
at the influence that advertising and media coverage have on our tables, with
documentary filmmaker Nick Versteeg providing an insider perspective.
And if a year of food studies is calling, know this: Genova only spoke poco Italian
when he started the course, but can now understand it. Classes are held in
English, and you can get more information at www.unisg.it/eng/. And surprisingly,
while there, he even lost weight.
In the series Food Culture: From Fast Food to Slow Food, individual classes are
$65, which includes the companion book or DVD; the package of eight is $480.
For more information, see www.bookstocooks.com/. Call 604-688-6755 to
register.
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