Alícia (Ali-mentació i Cien-cia; Alimentation and Science) is a research center devoted to technological innovation in cuisine and to the evaluation of the gastronomic heritage. It is a center with a social vocation where the main objective is improving people’s eating habits and achieving that everyone eats better.<br/>An important research has been done in Alícia Foundation on health and eating habits to establish cuisine as an active agent that seeks to offer culinary responses to dietary problems derived from specific illnesses and disorders. The aim is to improve the quality of life of people who require special diets, by adapting and creating specific dishes, and to provide them with tools that facilitate their enjoyment of food, while maintaining their preferences, culture and traditions.<br/>With culinary contributions, Alicia participates in clinical studies oriented to the improvement in diet and habits for certain pathologies, and has developed tools such as cooking solutions, recipes, educational material and workshops for various health problems. Alicia has been involved in research on cancer, diabetes, phenylketonuria (PKU), food allergies and intolerances, dysphagia, eye health, renal insufficiency, obstructive sleep apnea-hypopnea (OSAHS), and rare diseases like Prader-Willi syndrome, among others.<br/>The knowledge of chemical texture modifiers that were used in elBulli restaurant to create a unique dining experience for the customers is well known to Alicia Foundation multi-disciplinary team. All this knowledge has been compiled in “A Chef’s Guide to Gelling, Thickening, and Emulsifying Agents” and used as a basis to modify the texture if required.<br/>A successful example of the implementation of these chemical texture modifiers in providing culinary solutions, along with improving feeding requirements of cancer treatment depending on the location of the tumor, or in dysphagia patients will be discussed during the talk. An important stratum of population has benefitted by this research that is provided in a close and adaptive way to each patient, professional, family, care-giver, hospitals, associations and collectivities to improve people’s quality of life.

Improving quality of life in patients through culinary research

256th National Meeting (2018)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.