One of my favorite days in Italy was our business trip to Tuscany. We toured one of the oldest vineyards in Italy with a history going back hundreds of years. Each bottle of wine, oil, and balsamic vinegar is a years-long process requiring much patience and craft. After seeing the wine making process we sat down to enjoy a delicious lunch and wine tasting overlooking the vibrant scenery. After finishing a long lunch we headed to our tour of a pasta making company. We learned about the rich history and process of pasta making. The different colors of different pastas comes from the different types of wheats used and how much you sift the ground wheat. I learned that one of the main differences between Italian pasta and American pasta is the way we dry it. In American industrialized pasta making, the pasta is dried in high heat around 200 degrees fahrenheit. This ends up taking out the majority of the nutrients and leaving it with a yellow color and smooth texture. In Italy they let their pasta dry around 100 degrees fahrenheit, which is near the temperature of hot summer day in Italy. Their pasta retains the nutrients and has a light brown color and rough texture that holds onto the sauce better. This more natural processing is why some people who cannot handle gluten in America are able to enjoy it in Italy.
While pasta and wine pair very well together in a meal, business wise they had very different processes. However there was one thing that really stood out to me that both business owners focused on: quality over quantity. The pasta company could have expanded by simply taking in slightly less quality wheat and speeding up the drying process. The vineyard could have produced more wine by trying to expand and speeding up their processes. However, maintaining the quality and rich history behind their trade was much more important to them. This difference in priorities is evident in many other areas of Italian culture. After learning about the vineyard, we sat down to taste the wine and enjoy a meal. The meal, as most in Italy, was slow and relaxed. The food was brought out separately, and the focus was on not just enjoying the food, but enjoying food together. The restaurant was not trying to get in the largest quantity of customers but instead provide its customers with quality food and time together.
As I am preparing to come back to America and sadly leave behind the pasta and wine Italy is so famous for, I will not leave behind the values that Italian culture and businesses possess. In my future career, I believe it is worth considering the pros and cons of increasing quantity at the expense of quality. This reaches beyond just business into our personal lives as well. Three hour dinners are simply not possible for most of us, but we can take little steps to slow down and remember what’s important.
