Italian Farmers Praise The First Lady

[babylonsister]

This just made me laugh, translated from Polish, no less. And when exactly will the Obamas get a chance to eat those leftovers? :shrug:

http://watchingamerica.com/News/31144/italian-farmers-praise-the-first-lady/

Italian Farmers Praise The First Lady
By MJ/PAP (Polish News Agency)
Translated By Agnieszka Alot
9 July 2009
Edited by Caitlin Krieck
Poland - Newsweek Polska - Original Article (Polish)




The Coldrietti Society of Italian Farmers heartily praised Michelle Obama for her progressive use of the doggy bag during the recent family's stay in Rome.

The American president´s wife, together with her two daughters, dined at the ´I Maccheroni´ restaurant near Pantheon, Rome. The family ordered three pasta dishes, carbonara, amatriciana and bolognese, but the meal turned out to be too hearty for the three Obama women. And so Mrs. Obama asked the waiters to pack the leftovers into a bag to take home.

The First Lady's effort to make sure the food did not go to waste was widely understood as a public encouragement to save more and waste less.

The Farmer's Association has stated, "It's an important move against an epidemic in developed countries today-more that 30% of all the food product we buy are discarded without ever having been used."

[BlooInBloo]

1. Two words: real people.

[elleng]

2. Terrific! Been HOPING for more Italy news!

:-)

[Historic NY]

3. Doggy bag - tomorrows lunch yum...will the freepers call them cheap.

[RichardRay]

4. Back at the hotel after the kids have gone to bed...

with a nice bottle of wine, maybe with Reggie sitting in for a few minutes. Even the President gets the late night munchies.

[Adelante]

5. I just love her

:)

[rollingrock]

6. What a great lady

She never fails to impress me.

[Cha]

7. And, they really

liked the alimento!

[Kingofalldems]

8. A doggy bag? That's communism pure and simple.

[Jennicut]

9. Restaurants serve ridiculously huge servings, I always take a doggy bag home

And that pic cracks me up. :)

[CTyankee]

10. I've never had a really large serving in a restaurant in Italy. They tend to be small

but there are several courses. I don't blame them for wanting to try all 3 of those sauces. Bolognese in particular. When I was travelling in northern Italy I had different kinds of pastas with Bolognese sauce everywhere I went because it was so wonderful! I even had it in a cafeteria in Bologna. Amazing. The one in Verona was probably the most memorable. I vowed to make it once I got back to the US but I never did (I was lazy)...

[Dappleganger]

11. Italian food tastes better the next day

at least it does to me. Whenever dh and I go out we make it a policy to only eat half and bag the rest (it helps w/our diet), since portions are usually so large.

[JitterbugPerfume]

12. everything I learn about her

just makes me admire her more.

[Karenina]

13. The nuance you in Ami-land may miss

is that there is an "old school" attitude here that "bitte einpacken" is somewhat declasse (accent aigu) so Mz. FLOTUS just did a "waste not, want not" thang in the face of the hoiti-toities. And YES, that Italian pasta thang is kick-ass the next day!

The sheer amount of food wasted in developed nations is shameful and disgusting.

[AnnieBW]

14. It's the way she was raised

If she's anything like me, she was taught not to waste food growing up. I would imagine that anyone who grew up poor, or whose parents lived through the Depression, did the same things.