May Guest Lectures at UNISG
Following the visits at the beginning of May of sociologist George
Ritzer from the United States and Australian aquaculture expert Nick
Ruello, the rest of May at the University of Gastronomic Sciences also
saw a number of other important encounters between students and guest
lecturers, in addition to the regular academic activities.
On Tuesday May 23 Alain Ducasse met with Slow Food President Carlo Petrini for a discussion in the University’s main lecture hall on the theme of Raw materials and regions: their relationship to great cuisine.
The relatively informal encounter was attended by a large
number of students from the first and second years of the degree
course. Ducasse, one of the world’s most successful chefs, has
restaurants throughout the world. Among the topics discussed were
sustainability, food education and the importance of understanding and
adding value to the land.
These are topics with which Slow Food has been concerned for many years, developing as a result projects such as the Presidia and Terra Madre.
This year in addition to food producers and communities, chefs from all
over the world will also be participating in the Terra Madre event. In
encouraging the meeting of these two areas, food production and food
preparation, Slow Food is recognizing the importance of raw materials
and underlining the fact that without quality ingredients there cannot
be quality cuisine.
During the meeting Ducasse did not talk only about haute cuisine,
but also everyday cooking, and of the institutional food produced in
schools and hospitals, when often food quality is ignored. Instead the
variety of local products should be rediscovered and exploited.
The same week Enology and Sensory Analysis came together for the
second-year students from May 22-25, when they had the chance to
participate in a fascinating series of lectures and practical workshops
led by Ann Noble, Professor Emerita of Enology at the University of California, Davis, one of the world’s most prestigious wine schools.
Entitled “Wine sensory evaluation: From describing the indescribable to analytical sensory methodology”,
the four-day course outlined how to produce descriptive analyses of
wines and how to use these in mapping consumer preference. Practicals
included a white wine workshop, with a number of standards set up to
represent different possible flavors, such as honey, vanilla, lychee,
pineapple, bell pepper and asparagus. “Listen to your nose” exhorted
Professor Noble, as the students sniffed deeply at the standards.
Professor Noble is the creator of the Wine Aroma Wheel, a tool
that can be used to learn about wines and enhance one’s ability to
describe the complexity of wine flavor. The wheel is made of three
tiers: it has very general terms located in the center (e.g. fruity or
chemical), going to the most specific terms in the outer tier (e.g.
grapefruit or strawberries). Professor Noble is an internationally
renowned expert on the sensory evaluation of wine, giving the students
a unique opportunity to link two of their key subjects and deepen their
understanding of both of them.
The packed month at UNISG concluded on May 31 with a seminar on sparkling wines (including, naturally, a tasting) held with the Ferrari winery, one of the oldest and most prestigious brands in the Italian market.