Dealing with the concept of green (and other) transitions, we encourage participants to think in processual terms. The conference seeks contributions that can shed light on how current societal challenges transform gastronomy and what it means for producers, eaters, and food in different regional contexts. The conference explores and experiments with negotiations, dilemmas, and uncertainties concerning culinary sustainability. Our format and programme will generate critical food conversations that cultivate new dialogues, define new questions, and outline new directions for gastronomy in the future. What is ‘good, clean and fair’ food tomorrow, and how can gastronomy stabilize itself as an ecological field of research, study and practice?
Each of “The Seven Tables” will be independently organized by an organizational pair, in most cases, this is a specific research center at Aarhus University. Each table will ask a central question that sheds light on the directions, dilemmas and consequences of gastronomy in transition.
From fine dining to food democracy in a sustainability context
This table explores different interpretations of gastronomy; specifically, how new understandings emerge and work in different regional and political contexts and what this means for the green transition. We will focus on how chefs, foodies, and other gastronomes inspire everyday cooks and eaters, and vice versa, stimulating what is emerging as ‘everyday gastronomy’. By exploring the transfer of taste knowledge, ideas and practices of culinary sustainability, and the development of regenerative kitchens, we will discuss how these contribute to democratizing the craft of cooking.
Towards empowering consumers in the road to fair gastronomy
What role can consumer empowerment play in fostering fair and sustainable gastronomies? This table asks both about strategies for increasing consumer agency beyond making choices among products and for strategies for including those outside or at the margins of the category of the consumer. In a world with increasing uncertainties where different interests, desires and inheritances drive diverse visions for foodways, we gather to consider how a wide range of everyday voices can have a place in shaping food systems and policies.
How can sustainable and healthy gastronomy be available to all, regardless of background or income level?
Is there a need to make compromises between a healthier planet, taste, convenience and social aspects to gain food security and food sovereignty?
How do we address the difficulties that arise as the eating practices of some negatively impact those of others?
What kind of approaches we can use to increase consumer empowerment in food systems decision-making and does higher empowerment result in fairer gastronomy for all?
Is there anything wrong with medicalising our responses to unhealthy food?
We explore balancing food security with the toxicity of modern food systems. Industrial toxins in the food chain contribute to epidemics of non-infectious diseases. High levels of saturated fatty acids and sugar in highly processed food and ready meals increase disease risk. Meanwhile, antibiotic residues in animal products increase the risk of antimicrobial resistance and loss of gut microbiotic diversity, affecting inflammation. The global response is medicalisation: medicines such as Wegovy and supplements are used to reduce obesity, and new antibiotics are added. Simultaneously, the food industry provides affordable food, which is necessary given population growth, ageing, and increasing challenges of time-, energy- and financial poverty. Expansion of environments of urban digestion complicates the pathways from farm to table.
What gastronomic strategies can we imagine in a world with omnipresent toxins?
What are the alternatives to fast and cheap food in contexts of socioeconomic inequality, economic insecurity, and time poverty?
How can we replace or modify the use of antibiotics and other medicalised infrastructures in local and global food chains?
What are the bioethics involved in potentially making these changes for human and animal populations?
Gastronomy and perception innovation as a catalyst for sustainable and democratic food futures
Can gastronomic innovation help redefine how we produce, experience, and understand food in an era shaped by sustainability challenges, technological acceleration, and shifting consumer values. This session explores the intersection of culinary creativity and scientific insight in developing novel, responsible food experiences. From advanced culinary techniques to microbiome-informed fermentation and precision cooking, gastronomy is increasingly research-driven. Yet it remains deeply cultural, rooted in heritage, identity, and social practice. The session discussion will highlight how sensory perception informs menu design, product development, and the acceptance of sustainable ingredients. We will examine collaborations between chefs, researchers, and industry within sensory labs, experimental kitchens and living labs. Particular attention will be given to climate-conscious gastronomy and circular food systems. The session ultimately asks the question can gastronomy and food perception be positioned as catalysts for sustainable and democratic food futures?
Tastes have planetary effects, as practices of eating reshape ecologies.
This table asks about how eating practices affect the lives and deaths of other beings, not only on farms and in fields, but also beyond them. Food systems often negatively impact food webs, via land conversion, pesticides, and runoff. Yet food ways also build biodiverse landscapes and enable new relationalities. Overall, we focus on the wider ecologies of eating, in a literal sense, foregrounding more-than-human lifeways in relation to food procurement, preparation, and pleasure.
No farmers, no food!
Without farmers, we have no food. Yet the scale capital intensity and technological sophistication of modern farms present barriers for the next generation of food producers. They face, for example, mounting debt burdens, competition for land from investors, and structural disadvantages in accessing established supply chains., while at the same time being expected to provide green public goods, such as climate mitigation and biodiversity protection. This situation poses challenges to farmer’s abilities to contribute to innovation towards agri-food system redesign. We will work with these questions on this table centered around these questions:
Mutuality is a driver for culinary culture, gastronomic advancement, and innovation
Gastronomic and culinary activities take place in a large, multi-dimensional, and complex space spanned by different food cultures, traditions, and culinary practices; they involve many different actors regarding age, occupation, and mutual associations; and they are each involved in certain aspects of gastronomy in transition. All these dimensions are connected crisscross-wise, and their mutual connections are basis for conflicts, dilemmas, as well as unique potentials for gastronomic transformation, advancement, and innovation.
In lieu of presentation formats typical of a conference, our event will offer three modes of engagement that facilitate active participation and focus on dialogue and collaboration. These modes are described in the form of a Participation Menu with three options.
Deadline for call for papers is May 15, 2026.
Upload paper proposals as an abstract with maximum 300 words, pdf. Please note which Table you have applied for. You can only apply for one Table, but if you wish to be on a waiting list for another, it will be possible to register for this during the registration process.
You will receive a decision before 1st of July.
