#6 Mammoni and Mother’s taste
First year of the University of Gastronomic Sciences, Master’s Program in 2005
A son doted on by his mother is called a Mammone (Mammoni in plural) in Italy.
When I think of Mammoni, Luc Besson’s film “Grand Bleu” (1988) comes to mind. Director Luc Besson portrayed Enzo, the nemesis of the protagonist Jacques Mayol , as a typical Italian Mammone. Enzo Maiorca was the real Italian free diver played by Jean Reno in the film. There is a scene in which Enzo’s Mamma suddenly appears during a meal at a restaurant built on a cliff in Sicily. Mamma shows up at the restaurant with her own pasta and replaces the plate on Enzo’s table with her own. Enzo is usually pompous to everyone, but he become as small as a child with the arrival of his mother.
This scene impressed Italian men as Mammoni to the world. And I hear that “Gran Bleu” was banned in Italy for a long time, because the real Enzo sued Luc Besson for his mother’s depiction and other factual inaccuracies.
Actually Italian men consider themselves Mammoni? I tried to ask it to my Italian classmates. There were two types. Men from North Italy say “NO”, and men from the South say “Probably YES”.
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“What do you want to eat tonight?” called Mamma’s call is still alive in Italy. Just as I was talking about this topic with an Italian man from the North, He had said that he was different from Mammone. But just at that time he hung up the phone and said “I’m going out to eat tonight”. That was the call from his mother. I gave him my congratulations.
Italian Mammonism is closely related to homemade cooking. The major pasta companies ,such as Barilla and Buitoni, were born in the 1800s. It was not easy for Italian family to switch from mamma’s homemade pasta to industrial pasta , even if it was more convenient. For a long time, the competitors for manufacturing companies of pasta were not other manufacturers but Mamma. It was in the 1950s that Barilla began advertising on TV in attempt to replace Mamma’s pasta. For many years the sequence of children imagining Barilla’s pasta as a taste of home has been developed. Barilla has been making commercials like that one still now.
Barilla’s sequence that we saw during the lectures of PASTA at University was like this .
Parents visiting their son, who is working in Japan, head to the Ryokan (Japanese inn) where they are to meet up with their son, carrying Barilla for him. After a reunion hug, the mother happily shows Barilla to her son. Then the shoji (Japanese paper sliding door) behind her opens and the already cooked pasta is on the table. Next to her, a Japanese waitress smiles and shows her a box of Barilla. The son had asked to prepare the pasta in anticipation so that his parents would miss it. Finally, the usual catchphrase, “Where’s Barilla,there’s home.” is played at the end.
Although the self-cooking rate is still high in Italy, convenient foods like dried pasta are becoming general at home. In supermarkets, cut vegetables and frozen foods occupy a certain amount of space. In the past women had assisted family businesses, because there were many family businesses in Italy. But nowadays the number of family businesses is steadily decreasing, and women work outside the house.
Is that hasty mother’s taste regard as Mammonism? But it is true that mother’s taste is a symbol of motherhood, and meal is the opportunity to confirm one’s affiliation. When we go abroad, we miss the taste of our own country and feel our nationality, and when we leave our family, we miss our mother’s taste and learn anew who we are. The mother’s taste must appeal to the homing instinct and strengthen the bond between mother and family especially for men. If the employment rate of Italian women continues to rise, the taste of Mamma would diminish, and the Mammonism would also disappear?
Recently, obesity and taste deafness have become problems for Italian children, and the classes about food education (learning about taste and food stuff) have begun to be done. It seems that the place to learn to eat is changing from home to school , so I worry about extinction of Italian homemade taste and of Manmmoni too.
