João Rodrigues, chef at Canalha (Lisbon, Portugal), was in charge of opening the talks in the auditorium at this 26th edition of San Sebastian Gastronomika - Euskadi Basque Country. He took the opportunity to highlight the role of small producers and the enormous gastronomic wealth, always based on products, of Portugal, the guest country of the Congress.

He did this by explaining the Matéria project, launched in 2015 to support small producers. We saw that there were obstacles to preserving the country's traditions, culture and identity in rural areas because young people were looking for new opportunities in the cities," explained the chef, who also highlighted another problem: "Production is very irregular and the logistical problems are enormous.

Matéria Projecto links product, tourism and territory. It is a website that proposes itineraries around the country with the small producer as the common thread, a very simple site with more than 130 proposals, "a window into the life of each one". Each producer tells us what they make, explains their philosophy and gives us their address, email and direct contact to buy directly at a fairer price. "It is a way to create a brand and generate value. If there is interest, there is business and they can make a living from their product," Rodrigues sums up. It is a community of very interesting small projects," he added.

The project started with the product as a priority and with the travels a new world has opened up. Production has been humanised and we can see that these are people who do not have holidays or weekends, they are the guardians of the territory and create commercial interest for it,' the chef defined.

After inviting the participants on a journey through the country's enormous diversity and showing them a video about the daily life of small Portuguese producers, Rodrigues prepared two proposals for the participants to taste. The first combined a stew, 'that Sunday family recipe that goes from north to south of the country, but varies from house to house', with a pork sausage typical of his gastronomy, on toast in the shape of Portugal. You can eat the whole country in one snack," he sums up. He then prepared a recipe with hake as the main ingredient and baby octopus as a side dish, a black and white dish that is the result of a collaboration with a late Portuguese surrealist painter, an artist who in his first phase only painted in black and white. These are two dishes that are totally influenced by culture and that are important for small producers," he concluded.