Cuisine Essay -- Health, Food

A cuisine cannot simply be defined as a particular group of food associated with a geographic location. To understand a cuisine equal understanding of the culture to which it belongs must exist. A culture, such as the population of Italy, manipulates the presentation and substances of a cuisine to something representative of that culture. This makes a cuisine much more than food on a plate; a cuisine includes history, both of those making the dish and the ingredients and cooking styles that form the final product. A cuisine includes pride of nationality and personality. Similarly culture is more than a geographic location; it is a way of living and a respect for a group of beliefs and traditions. To understand this relationship between culture and cuisine certain information must be addressed; information such as the demographic figures surrounding a culture, the specific effect Italian culture has on Italian food, as well as the ingredients and cooking skills applied in the Italian cuisine. Consequences of the Italian cuisine will also be identified, both nutritional value and health detriments and how these effects may continue into the future. Cuisine can be split into two stages: pre-swallow and post-swallow (Crotty 1995). Pre-swallow is based around social aspects of cuisine (Gallegos 2011) such as who does the cooking and why people eat the food that they eat. Post-swallow is concerned with the effects food has once eaten; post-swallow also deals with the nutritional and health impacts that food has on consumers. When deconstructing a cuisine it becomes clear that demographic information plays an important role in the pre-swallow stage. Gender, age, location, religion and government influence all have a contribution to s... ... continue to rise. A symptom of obesity, cardiovascular disease, remains the highest cause of death in Italy at 16% (World Health Organisation 2006) followed by cerebrovascular disease, better known as a stroke, at 14%. Both of these diseases are caused by diet, particularly a high cholesterol diet and with western food chains such as McDonalds becoming more entrenched in Italian culture it is reasonable to believe these causes of death will remain the same into the future unless a regression into healthy local Italian cuisine is taken. To conclude, Italy is a diverse location both in terms of geographic regions and cultural traditions, it is only fitting that it has a diverse cuisine, full of history, religion and most important of all the soul of the Italian people. Its mark on world cuisine through innovation and passion last a long time.