Final Word from Friday, January 9, 2004
Czech bakeries are rubbing their hands, and Czech consumers are smacking their lips, after sales of baked goods soared in Dec. Unlike in the U.S. and U.K., where the high-protein, high-fat Atkins diet is affecting sales of high-carbohydrate foods, Czechs continue blissfully in their old ways. Czechs remain some of the most rounded people in Europe, and there always seems to be a jumbo-size person in your way wherever you go. The Atkins diet has attracted quite a few adherents who want to shed their extra kilos, according to MFD, but it would take more than translating a bestseller or two into the local language to get most Czechs to give up their bread and potatoes. Many Czechs say that a slice of fresh Šumava bread with butter is simply too good to pass over. Only if Health Minister Marie Součková found a reason to ban it would Czechs adopt a no-bread diet.