What does the Alícia Foundation do?
Research with scientific rigor so that we eat better.
Since when have you been researching?
We just turned… 20 years of life!
Congratulations! Why Alicia?
“Ali” for food and “cia” for science.
What does science say about eating?
That we are “cooking” animals.
Cookivores?
More than omnivores (eating everything) we are cocinovores (eating cooked): our evolution is linked to cooking.
Define kitchen.
Art of predigesting food.
Boiled, cooked, roasted…
…marinated, fermented… Evolutionarily, cooking saved us a lot of energy in the digestive function.
And that energy saving… for what?
The brain took advantage of it: its 2% of body weight uses 20% of our calories!
We are children of the kitchen, then.
For two and a half million years, cooking has improved the world. Every culinary novelty carries knowledge.
What has Ferran Adrià meant?
Ferran Adrià is to the art of cooking what Pablo Picasso is to the plastic arts.
Of construction?
And creativity. And it has transcended into everyday cooking and restaurants. From extraordinary cuisine to ordinary cuisine!
What does Alícia do with that knowledge?
Go deeper into it to always eat better. For example, in diseases.
What diseases?
We have investigated how to cook so that certain patients eat better.
Give me an example.
Look at the Oncoalicia.com page: we have researched, designed and posted a ton of useful recipes for every oncological treatment and sixty ailments.
This is wonderful.
During chemotherapy, flavors change, and we help the patient make food enjoyable. And sores in the mouth are not the same as low salivation or difficulty swallowing… We give recipes that are easy to cook for the patient’s relatives.
Thanks for helping us!
And with whatever you have in your fridge, if you don’t feel like going out, we’ll tell you what to cook.
Here is some very useful research.
And diabetics can go to our page Diabetesalacarta.org: we show how to make a healthy and tasty weekly menu at home.
More diseases they help with?
Epileptics can reduce their outbreaks through dietary habits such as carbohydrate-free pizzas…
“Tampanpizza”!
And fake fried eggs, thanks to the spherification devised by Ferran Adrià, and also fake cakes… Because eating is also a relational experience that today you don’t have to deprive yourself of… thanks to our scientific findings.
Again Ferran Adrià!
Ferran Adrià taught us to work with nutritionists, technologists, chemists… to create knowledge. And with doctors, like the great cardiologist Valentín Fuster.
And do you think about food for the elderly?
Yes, textures against dysphagia. And food bars in towns and neighborhoods: a bar is more important than a town hall for social life! We advise your menus.
What other groups do you take care of at the Fundació Alícia?
Peasants and farmers! Small rural producers. We accompany them to innovate: bean pâtés, chickpea pâtés, high protein broths….
Do these groups need help?
Large monopolistic agri-food companies are eliminating them… and in the end, unfortunately, the food will reach us from too far away and it will no longer be healthy, sustainable or tasty food.
I see you worried.
The closest food is healthy, sustainable and good. Why replace toast with oil with… toast with avocado? We have 1,500 year old olive trees here…
What did your mother cook for you?
Zucchini omelette: unbeatable! A well-done fried egg. Stewed beans. Lenten cod. Fritters. Every dish that is lost is a drama!
Did our grandparents eat better or do we eat better?
We eat better than our grandparents ate and worse than our parents.
How to improve?
To avoid being squatters of our children, let’s eat more legumes and less meat: chickpeas with spinach… they are amazing!
I take note, I take note.
In our courses on health and nutrition we summarize this issue like this: more sardines and less aspirin!
