Prohibitive bills and dogs eating at the table with their owners: what happened to the restaurants of the small medieval historic towns of the Marche and Umbria? Reflections on a change of era...
by Luigino Bruni
published in the Messaggero di Sant'Antonio on 03/04/2025
In recent months I have happened to eat a couple of times in restaurants in our small medieval historic towns in the Marche and Umbria. Two things struck me, two signs of a real change of era. The first concerns the prices of those restaurants. By now when you enter any restaurant in one of these cities - mine were Montefalco and Urbisaglia - it is practically impossible to eat an appetizer, a first course and a side dish without spending less than 50 euros. The chef immediately arrives and presents the menu of the day, then they bring a taste of oil and "homemade" soups, as they say; then bread baked from their oven, highly refined dishes, all served with luxurious plates and glasses - all accessories that, of course, in the end you pay for. If, by chance, one also takes a second and half glass ("goblet") of wine, one ends up spending 80 euros per person. Only ten years ago, you could eat for 20/30 euros, and the difference certainly does not depend on inflation.
What happened? The boom of Italian food and wine in the world has meant that many new places have sprung up to capture a new international, elderly and wealthy tourism; with the side effect that the old restaurants have had to change style and menu and ... prices. And so, if a family with children, from the middle class, wants to go to a restaurant, they can do it a couple of times a year, at most. In other words, the restaurant market is becoming a matter of wealthy elites, increasingly non-Italian, with the consequent alienation of the non-wealthy natives. The praiseworthy slow-food movement has done very well, but it has certainly not helped to calm restaurant prices. There would be a need for a new movement of restaurants that allow "normal" people to get closer to good food.
The second aspect concerns dogs, a theme that when I touched it in the past it gave me several curses and friends who took away my Facebook friendship. I'll try again, treasuring past experiences. In both restaurants there was a dog in the dining room who, perched on the chair, ate in his bowl on the same table as the "masters". By now, I thought, only Lazarus is left under the table of the rich man, even the dogs have gone upstairs. In the homes of Italians there are about 20 million dogs and cats, more dogs than cats. A recent phenomenon that has exploded in the last ten years. Here too the question: what does it depend on? Given that the presence of dogs and cats in homes is something beautiful, it improves people's well-being, often health, the company of the elderly and lonely people. Their presence enriches everyone's life, increases the common good. According to an (original!) theologian friend of mine, they are one of the mysterious presences of spiritual beings cousins of angels. In my house there have always been cats and dogs, I grew up in their beautiful company.
Having said that, and all the other nice things I could say about dogs and cats, we have to talk about it. We like dogs and cats very much for many reasons. An important, and too underemphasized, one concerns the change that our relationships are undergoing. We find it increasingly difficult to accept the ambivalence of human beings, the wounds they inflict on us. We do not like suffering from abandonment, mourning, conflicts and quarrels. Thus in the decrease of human relationships and friendships, relationships with dogs and cats grow, which present themselves as relationships made up of "blessing without injury". Above all, dogs treat us like their gods, they are faithful, they never betray us, they wait for us in the evening when we return jumping and barking.
Why, then, invest in human relationships full of potential injuries if I have the opportunity to have a dog, which is a source of only joy? We don't realize it, but behind the choice to buy a dog there is also this. Nothing wrong, as long as we keep something important in mind. As psychology teaches us - that of Lacan in particular - the most sublime happiness lies in desiring a desire that desires us as we desire it. Only people can satisfy this need. Of course, we could say that our dog also desires us (cats not much), but it is certainly a different desire, asymmetrical and without reciprocity between peers. With dogs and cats the wounds are minor (when they get sick and die there is suffering), but the blessings are also minor. It will be this famine of "desiring desires" that will give us back the desire to have children and to have more friends - and to continue to have some animals as well.
Photo credit: © Giuliano Dinon / Archivio MSA