Tourism & Hospitality | Thursday 28 June, 2018 10:31 am |

According to the Hotels.com®Tasty Travels* report,two thirds of millennials in KSA (63%)admitted a destination’s cuisine is the biggest deciding factor when picking where to holiday, with special offers (10%), beautiful beaches (54%)and the shopping scene (21%)being less appetizing. The younger generation are now even more focused on munching delicious local delicacies on holiday (56%)than visiting landmarks (55%)and exploring the outdoors (25%). 

 

Paris (27%), Tokyo (23%) and Rome (22%) have topped a list of the hottest spots on earth for foodies. Paying tribute to these delicious destinations, Hotels.com has collaborated with food artist Carl Warner to bring foodies’ favourite hangouts to life, using the city’s famous food ingredients - Parisian buildings made of cheese, the Pantheon made of pasta and Mount Fuji made of seaweed, every city looks good enough to eat. 

 

Top 7 Foodie Cities Paris (27%) Tokyo (23%) Rome (22%) London (21%) New York (16%) Barcelona (16%) Madrid (14%)

 

It’s food over friends these days, as 80%admit they prefer tosnap their food than their friends’ faces (26%)for Instagram #sorrynotsorry. The research found a gut-busting rise in food photography on social media, as on a week’s holiday, Millennial travelers snap on average 110 photos, of which almost a quarter are of food. 

 

The Hotels.com survey also revealed that pizza & pasta (60%)are the food KSA Millennialsare most likely to post on social media, followed by indulgent desserts like donuts and freak shakes (12%)and Americana burgers (34%).Young travelers don’t play it safe with their food choices either, as one in five claimed they’d love to try chicken feet (27%)and garlic ice cream (15%).

 

To celebrate the mouth-watering combination of food and travel, renowned food artist Carl Warner has created a unique collection of artworks bringing the top foodie destinations to life. Each city scene, captured in HD photography, is deliciously constructed with famous foods from each location. Parisian markets and the Eiffel Tower are built with decadent chocolate and blue cheese; the Pantheon and a cobbled back street in Rome are brought to life with pasta, parma ham and Parmesan cheese; while a serene zen garden and tea ceremony are imagined with maki rolls, ginger and shiitake mushrooms overlooking Mount Fuji, in Warner’s tribute to Tokyo. Watch them being built HERE.

 

Food artist and photographer Carl Warner, said, “When Hotels.com approached me with the idea, I instantly knew this project was right up my bean cobbled, blue cheese street! It was a great opportunity for me to bring images and scenes of these hugely popular foodie destinations to life in an exciting and contemporary way. I hope that these images will not only blow people away, but inspire them to get online, get booking and not just 'sight-see' but 'sight-taste’.”

 

Eating experiences are in fact now so high on the Saudi Arabia Millennial travel tick-list,(81%)travelers said foodie experiences stand out the most in their holiday memories. This topped spending time with their travel buddy (15%),and even a cheeky adrenaline activity (10%)#TastyTravels. 

 

Johan Svanstrom, President of Hotels.com brand comments: “The love amongst Millennial travellers for what we at Hotels.com have dubbed #TastyTravels, stems from food being one of the most connective and rewarding currencies there is. Experiences are the new wealth and food provides one of life’s most pleasurable experiences, where there’s always something new to try when you travel. So, it’s understandable that younger generations of travellers are defining their holiday by what they can eat, how they eat it, and how good the ‘Grams’ will be while they’re away”.

 

Flavour-chasing travellers in search of inspiration for their next #TastyTravels can head to the Hotels.com Facebookpage to see the three delicious artworks by Carl Warner come to life. Download the Hotels.com mobile app to choose from hundreds of thousands of places to stay in these delicious destinations … get eating! Don’t forget with Hotels.com Rewards you can collect 10 hotel nights and get one free – you’ll most likely spend it scoffing the world’s greatest street food.