To commemorate International Mediterranean Diet Month in May, we’re having an online celebration, and inviting some of Oldways’ dearest friends. Each day throughout the month, we’ve asked one of the hundreds of talented cookbook authors, journalists, scientists, food retailers, importers and chefs we’ve traveled with over two decades, to share a “Mediterranean Memory” originating from Oldways’ culinary and cultural Symposiums [2] around the Mediterranean region.
As we’ll hear from a number of Oldways’ friends, these Symposiums – organized by us to get Americans familiar with Mediterranean ingredients and preparations after we introduced the Mediterranean Diet Pyramid [3] in 1993 – were special. Special because the people (a who’s who of the food world), the places we visited (Barcelona, Madrid, and Seville in Spain; Morocco, Tunisia, Turkey, Chios, and Lesbos, Crete, Thessaloniki in Greece; and Sicily, Pantelleria, Puglia [4], Campania, Liguria, Emilia Romagna, Tuscany, Piedmonte, and Rome in Italy); and the producers of intensely local food and wine all combined to create a recipe for life-changing experiences and long-lasting impacts.
I’ve thought about the last twenty years, trying to choose a pinch-me memory of my own to introduce the magic of Mediterranean Diet Month in May, and I can’t pick just one. In fact, I had trouble narrowing it down to even a dozen:
What all of these memories point toward is that the pleasure of Mediterranean eating and living can be simple and is something we can all experience. That is my hope for Mediterranean Month – that everyone reading this will give the healthy and exquisitely simple Mediterranean Diet a try each day, and be sure to treat yourself to a Mediterranean Memory-A-Day and visit our blog throughout the month of May. A big thanks to Oldways communication experts Rachel Greenstein and Kyle Potvin for planning our online celebration and making it happen!
-Sara Baer-Sinnott, President of Oldways
Links
[1] https://oldwayspt.org/bio/sara-baer-sinnott
[2] https://oldwayspt.org/programs/culinary-travel/past-trips-photos-memories
[3] https://oldwayspt.org/resources/heritage-pyramids/mediterranean-diet-pyramid
[4] https://oldwayspt.org/programs/culinary-travel/past-trips-photos-memories/puglia-italy-2006
[5] https://oldwayspt.org/about-us/founder-history
[6] https://oldwayspt.org/programs/culinary-travel/past-trips-photos-memories/morocco
[7] https://oldwayspt.org/programs/culinary-travel/past-trips-photos-memories/sicily
[8] https://oldwayspt.org/programs/culinary-travel/past-trips-photos-memories/istanbul
[9] https://oldwayspt.org/categories/mediterranean-diet