The contemporary world is acquiring a different perception in terms of flavors and preferences, leaning peculiarly to exquisiteness. This refinement is not only about good food and wine, but rather about a subtle move toward other spheres that belong to people’s everyday lives.

Fashion, arts, music, travel, hobbies and even technology rank among the many preferences that join the gourmet style people long for. This is the distinction among flavors that long ago were closely tied to good food and drinks –with a solely exclusive choice for wines. Today, the gourmet style reels in buffs as an increasingly larger number of people embrace this lifestyle. However, historic references dating back from ancient Rome reveal the predilection of some warriors for sumptuous banquets in which exquisiteness and refinement were all that mattered.

A Little Bit of History… Since the year 66 BC, Roman Senator Lucius Licinio Luculous had indulged himself into several of life’s most obvious pleasures. He built a huge mansion –only the part of the house called Horti Lucullani or Loculou’s Gardens is still standingwhere he hosted amazing feasts in any of its dozen luxurious dinning rooms or halls scattered all around the tiny palace. Exquisite food was an indissoluble part of cultural advance. Loculous also built a well-stocked library that he eventually opened to the public. As time went by, the library became a meeting ground for many of Rome’s cultural boldface names, especially the philosophers. This sumptuousness turned out to be a token of exquisiteness and refinement that gave way to the expression “Luculian meals.” Luculous is now remembered as the “gourmet of classic Rome.”

The commonest fondness of consumers for the enjoyment of pleasures marked in time a definition of gourmet –a person staunchly committed to the refined pleasure of the senses, especially good food and wine, with a built-in ability to taste the talents of cooking in terms of flavor, finesse and quality of certain foodstuffs and spirits. Gourmet is a French-origin expression that in the past used to personify the “valet in charge of wine cellars.” Today and in that same language, its definition is an alteration of the term gourmand, also meaning a person with a peculiar liking for good food and wine, though it might also refer to a gluttonous patron.

21st Century Gourmet In the gastronomic realm, by means of his observations a gourmet can tell whether a particular dish is a delicatessen, if it meets the requirements of good preparation and cooking so closely related to haute cuisine.

The contemporary world has made gourmet take on a broader connotation no longer solely linked to the pleasures of good food and drinks, but rather a meaning that goes beyond its original boundaries and now touches on other parts of life –always with a view of authenticity and quality. The gourmet is now described as a world of sensations and delicatessens in which in which taste, finesse, exquisiteness and good service must prevail is what gourmet is actually all about. Just above flavors, the gourmet is now more of a way of life or a lifestyle.

Strategies among gourmet makers take into account the ever-changing character of markets, as well as a bevy of preferences and priorities among consumers, the trends and habits of each and every society in which such factors as age, tastes and walks of life exert a tremendous influence on. No one ca deny that the world population is acquiring an increasing liking for better lifestyles, therefore the trends point to more demanding and selective patrons in terms of brands and the kind of products they consume, the services they receive and the thoroughness for details because as the philosophy it really is, the gourmet has panned out to be a lifestyle all by itself.

Menus that are pieced together in the 21st century are a far cry from what ancient people wallowed in long ago, and not so long ago, just a few years ago. Nowadays, ingredients and lifetime sensations are alternated, thus meals are served before any consumer’s eyes with a stamp of a more universal artistic beauty all over it, marked by good taste and refinement.

It’s all about quenching the customer’s pleasures, so that explains why either the humblest or the most sophisticated and exotic dishes are spruced up in a peculiar fashion, in some cases with such oddities as the petals of edible roses. For customers that practice this peculiar way of life offers are galore, ranging from bars, restaurants, barbecues, cable TV, and specialized stores called delis that sell top-of-the-line items.

Gastronomy is the promoter of gourmet, nevertheless other pleasures are putting on quite a competitive show these days. The long list has now been engrossed with travel agencies that cater to tourists with tantalizing and original choices, tailormade customized trips to such exotic destinations as China, Ethiopia and Egypt, let alone breathtaking options of nature adventure, cruise journeys and the much-acclaimed spas featuring a number of health therapies, esthetic techniques and relaxation.

And cigars are also on that list as well. That’s an item that provides pleasure and reflects a good lifestyle. It’s been coveted for over 500 years, either as the delicate snuff, the common pipe tobacco, the sleek cigarette, as a chewing ball or an elegant habano. Today, cigars are sweeping people off their feet all over the world, mainly well-off youngsters and beautiful women seduced by this new token of status –a major player in the gourmet way of life.