In 1905 Santiago Rusiñol wrote a monologue, The escudel-o-meterIn it, he proposed a utopia. "An enormous widget would allow the stew to flow from every tap in every house. Noodles, stew meat, chickpeas, and rice would all come out." "Rusiñol reflects what escudella represents for Catalans, if our happiness depends on escudella flowing from the taps," explains Toni Massanés, general director of the Alícia Foundation, which is participating in the escudella monograph programmed at the Girona Gastronomic Forum. For Josep Roca, of El Celler de Can Roca, "it's a soup that can be popular but also imbued with solemnity. It's a lifestyle inside a pot." But apart from the sociological aspect, there is also scientific evidence. It's not an exaggeration to say that we are evolutionarily programmed to like escudella.