The popular spread is becoming American, an occasion to help find a new identity for the peninsula, and the US, or lose it.
It happened only to Coca-Cola, the symbolic brand that represented — and still represents — America. During the Cold War, people weren’t drinking a cold, fizzy syrup; they were swallowing, in large gulps, a longing for freedom against oppression. It’s such an iconic product that rivals like Pepsi or the Italian chinotto measured themselves only by how they differed from Coke.
Nutella is the only other food product in the world that has given its name to an entire nutrition category — cocoa- or hazelnut-based spreadable creams.
But Coca-Cola represented the US, a clear and precise ideology, a front to fight from. The unique shape of its bottles was synonymous with the Stars and Stripes.
Nutella is not that. Nutella is a paradox. It represents “Italian-ness” beyond Italy as a political element. It is the spearhead of Italian culture and centuries of its history. Compared to Coca-Cola, it has broader, vaguer boundaries.
Clearly, everything goes behind Nutella — other spreads, of course, but then biscuits, pasta, cheeses, sauces, and then comes the beauty: taste, tourism, sun, mountains, and sea.
The spearhead is very strong, but the rest is even stronger: worse than a Macedonian phalanx. It’s a material-industrial culture, disorganized, chaotic, with imprecise borders, yet precisely recognized and imitated everywhere.
The paradox is that while Coca-Cola had an almost consubstantial relationship with the U.S. government, Nutella and other food products are entirely independent of the Italian government. In fact, whichever Italian government is in office weighs them down and hinders them. Better if it stayed out of the way.
The best of Italy lives despite its government. It’s an oddity that has persisted for many years, rooted in the essence of Italy, whose cultural concept long predated the political unity.
In theory, it should be resolved sooner or later; in reality, that does not seem to be happening. The present government did create a Ministry of Made in Italy, which used English to stress “Italianity”. But it’s not about crude interventions like putting the current premier’s face on a packet of pasta or a jar of spread. It’s about the global flow of culture back and forth from Italy.
Recently, there was a key step: Ferrero, the owner of Nutella, bought Kellogg’s Corn Flakes, the emblematic American breakfast brand. Iconic value multiplied exponentially.
It’s simply the old journey from Italy to America. The tradition of southern Italian dishes became a sign of identity across the ocean. Pizza has remained essentially the same, with different forms, anchored to various regional traditional pies, not just Neapolitan.
Sunday baked white pasta became “mac and cheese,” caffè latte became “latte.” Family-run little shops became chains like Pizza Hut, Domino’s, Starbucks, and Costa Coffee. Italian American food then invaded the world, without any political content.
From there, they returned to Italy and gave a sense of cultural identity and unity to a peninsula that was, foodwise and otherwise, quite divided. Pasta and pizza became national symbols, whereas only a few decades ago, they were confined to the south. In the north, there was rice and polenta, and pastas were made with eggs, soft (not durum) wheat, and stuffed. America’s returned meals created the country.
What will American Nutella, together with breakfast cereals, do to Italy in a few years? Now everyone agrees: we think with our guts as much as with our brains. Can corn flakes, Nutella, make or lose an identity?
Moreover, the first wave of Italian products was about little more than home-made dishes; there was no brand, no commercial strategy. This time, Ferrero is just the opposite: it’s a strategic company expansion.
Here is a little warning. US Nutella is sweeter than the original Italian one and less nutty. No problem, Coke’s taste changes too depending on the country.
But unlike Coke, guzzled down in a few seconds from a can, crushed and thrown away, Nutella is savored from a jar over weeks or months; thus, the two flavors have sparked a double circulation in America: Italian- or US-made Nutella.
Perhaps, there should be clearer indications and sales of the two. You don’t want your gut-brain to get too confused and for the Italian identity to go down the drain. This will also confuse the American identity. Pizza, Mac and cheese, and espresso are now part of US culture and identity. Can Nutella be added to peanut butter and jelly, partially or totally replacing them? And what will it do to Americans? Here, the spread’s content of ‘nuttiness’ may matter, no?
