Orthodox (1). The official language is Greek, although there is knowledge of English in a large percentage of the population, as it is also taught in school.


Although Greece is a developed country with a high standard of living, it has been experiencing a debt


crisis since 2010; as a result unemployment is quite high (currently at 27.8%, reaching 56% for younger Greeks) (5).


The life expectancy in Greece is 83.1 years. The leading causes of death are heart disease, cancer,


cerebrovascular diseases, respiratory diseases, and accidents (4). According to the latest Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reports, Greece has the highest percentage of overweight children (including obesity) worldwide, with 44% of boys and 38% of girls aged 5 to 17 being overweight or obese (6).


Greece has gone through several economic and societal transitions over the past 50 years. In the 1960s,


Greece had one of the lowest rates of heart disease in the world, partly due to the prototype of what is now widely known as the Mediterranean Diet (7,8). Over the years many Greeks moved from rural areas to larger towns and cities, and their financial situation improved. With urbanization and affluence the diet and lifestyle changed drastically. People started producing less of their own food and depending more on ready-made, packaged food. Furthermore, they began consuming more meat and adopting a westernized diet that included fewer fish, legumes, vegetables, and fruit and more saturated fat and energy-dense foods. Since the financial crisis began a few years ago, the diet has been modified slightly to accommodate the change in status of many Greeks (9-11). However, rather than returning to the traditional Greek diet which was based on vegetables, olive oil, and very little meat (an affordable and healthy choice), there is instead a dependence on fast food such as hamburgers, sandwiches, and pizza, because of their convenience and cost effectiveness (12,13).


The traditional Greek diet is centered on cereals, olive oil, and vegetables, the basis of which was the Mediterranean Diet (6,8). The first ever study of the Mediterranean Diet happened somewhat accidentally in 1948 when the Greek government invited the Rockefeller Foundation to investigate the standard of living in postwar Crete (7,8,14,15). The researchers investigated the diet as well as other living habits. They found that the diet in rural Crete—which consisted mainly of bread, wild greens, fruits, herbs, beans, olive oil, and wine, with very little meat—was nutritionally adequate compared to the US nutrition standards. In the 50s and 60s there was great interest in studying eating habits in the Mediterranean. A prospective study led by US physiologist Ancel Keys found that people in the Mediterranean had low rates of heart disease; this was attributed to the diet and the type of fat consumed (16). It was not until 1993 that the term “Mediterranean Diet” was introduced by Oldways, the Harvard School of Public Health, and the European Office of the World Health Organization. It was defined as a diet based on that of Greece, Crete, and Southern Italy circa 1960 (8,17). However, it is important to distinguish between the traditional Greek rural diet, which is what the majority of Greeks followed and was mostly vegetarian, and the urban Greek cuisine, which was what more affluent Greeks ate at the time (in the 1950s and 1960s) and had been introduced by the popular chef Tselmentes. The latter became the standard cuisine as the financial status of Greeks improved and they moved to larger cities. The urban Greek cuisine included more meat, and dishes that traditionally were for special occasions became more commonplace (18).


One of the most important components of the traditional Greek diet is the inclusion of many vegetable dishes as a main course. A typical meal could be seasonal vegetables cooked with olive oil, herbs, and


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