A Balanced Diet

Organic food, vegetarian diet, and healthy eating habits are still very rare in local cuisine.

Many Europeans would agree that a balanced diet is one of the pillars of a healthy life style. But this does not necessarily translate into practice, as for most people their intake of food has always been treated like a stepchild. Studies have shown that less than 10 percent of the interviewed nourish on healthy food and another 10 percent admit just following their good taste. The fact that chronic diseases and obesity due to bad eating habits is soaring suggests that even the recent craze for beauty, spa, and youthfulness has stopped short of most people's minds.

The food industry has long taken advantage of the gap between health-consciousness and eating habits, offering assumedly healthy products for an unhealthy price. Since 1990 sales of convenient food have doubled and will do so within the coming six years. This is because many consumers prefer taking vitamin pills and other supplements or even calorie-reduced products in order to feel no regret about attributing such a low priority to food.

The old saying "The secret is in the sauce" can be reinterpreted so as to fit the picture that your personal secret of well-being is locked in the way of what and how you eat. But while dear and comforting habits can make you happy, the food you consume may not. Mass processed convenience food is often low in nutrients, and if there is a link between food and wellness, then canned and microwaved food would not part of the deal.

In Europe the growing societal weight of movements like 'slow food' indicate that a slowly but surely rethinking of eating habits is taking place. Moreover, the demand for locally grown and seasonal food as well as fresh produce, which is taken right to one's own stove, is on the rise. Not surprisingly, the idea of consuming organic food has already entered the mainstream, causing some stores to declare them temporarily out of stock.

The search for integrating pleasure and physical well-being into a single concept can be traced back to the 1990s. This development is paralleled by another trend, the so-called 'cuisine vitale,' which is novel insofar as it allows personal preferences to select the food items from a broad range of absolutely biologically grown food. Despite all this, there will still be a long way to go before people will have realized that individual vitality and personal food habits are irresolvable intertwined and cannot be separated. So get yourself informed about the diverse offerings in the broad field of spa and browse in our wellness glossary.