A Month Ago: celebrating Australia Day with a Fair Feed Breakfast

Thinking back of a lovely day in the park with a true South Aussie barbie brekkie...

Every year on 26 January Australian friends and family get together to celebrate being Australian, living their good lives in the land Down Under, and 'celebrate what's great about Australia'.*  It is a day to get together in parks and on beaches, to organise pick-nicks and barbies, or to attend one of the many events that are being organised in local communities. The Drover and I attended such a local community event, organised by Slow Food Adelaide & Barossa, where we did not only celebrate what is good about Australia, but also what is good about eating local food.

Italian breakfast and the dynamism of a man

Did you know that it is possible to become a dynamic man, by eating biscuits for breakfast?

Italy would not be Italy without Mulino Bianco, a brand known for it’s biscuits that Italian mamma’s love to give their children for breakfast with a cup of warm milk or orzo (barley coffee) to dip them in. But according to Mulino Bianco, biscuits are just as good a breakfast for adults that supposedly become very ‘dynamic’ by having five or six Batticuori (beating hearts), Spicchi di Sole (patches of sunlight) or Abbracci (hugs) in the morning, combined with una tazza di caffè, a small tub of yoghurt and some fresh fruit. All the different packets of the biscuits have a suggestion for a real colazione all’italiana (Italian breakfast) that comes with one of the ten principles of the morning meal like ‘taste the flavours’, ‘start the day with warmth’ and ‘find your own rhythm’.

Curious as I am I wanted to know more about the story of these ten principles and thus had a look on the website. It turns out that Mulino Bianco has developed a model of the real Italian breakfast with the help of scientists from various disciplines. The model shows a food pyramid that has biscuits and breads (sweet breads are also part of their range of products…) at the bottom of the pyramid, therefore being the most important part of the meal. The biscuits are being followed by milk and yoghurt, fruit, hot drinks, sugar, honey and jam and at the small top butter. Not only can you find more information about the different categories of the breakfast pyramid, you can also learn more about the importance of love, trust, warmth, energy, care and the pleasure of starting the day with the family around the breakfast table. The project supposedly has ‘a great scientific and cultural value’ and gives guidelines to start the day full of warmth, pleasure and balance. Obviously this is exactly the way the Italians like it, seen the amount of choice in and the quantity of Mulino Bianco biscuits in the supermarket aisles!