Ritrovo Selections

Seattle importer Ritrovo, launched in 2000 by Ron Post and Ilyse Rathet, brings in regional Italian foods from small producers and supports the Slow Food movement.

About Ritrovo Selections

Based in
Seattle, Washington
Founded
2000
Known for
importing foods from small Italian regional producers

Ron Post and Ilyse Rathet launched Ritrovo in Seattle in 2000. It grew out of relationships they built with Italian producers while teaching English in Italy in the 1990s. Today the company imports and distributes Italian regional foods from small producers, supports Slow Food, and is woman owned.

Post and Rathet met at the University of Washington in a class for teachers of English as a second language. They taught in Italy for about six years from 1993, and both earned diplomas from the Italian Association of Sommeliers.

Ritrovo Selections questions

What is Slow Food?

Slow Food is a movement that began in Italy as a protest against a McDonald's opening near the Spanish Steps in Rome, and Carlo Petrini is its founder. It encourages local and seasonal ingredients, protects heritage seeds and breeds of farm animals, and works for what it calls good, clean and fair food for all. Ritrovo supports Slow Food and works with small regional producers in Italy.

How does Ritrovo choose its producers?

In a 2005 Seattle Times interview, co-founder Ron Post said that he and co-founder Ilyse Rathet return to Italy often to stay with, eat with and work alongside their producers. They look for a regional favorite and, in Post's words, translate it for the American market, and they see part of their job as explaining those regional foods to American cooks and buyers.

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