Religious food as a tourism attraction: the roles of Buddhist temple food in Western tourist experience

Abstract

Recently, the needs and interests in local food-related tourism research are growing as the local food plays an important role in overall tourist experience and destination branding. However, research on the religious food as a culinary heritage has received relatively little attention and particularly an understanding of tourists' religious food consumption in a tourist destination has been little discussed in the literature of tourism research. Given the scarcity of research on the religious food as a tourist attraction, this study attempts to explore the roles of the Buddhist temple food in Western tourists' experience. To identify the objective of this study, travel blogs written in English were applied. As a result of content analysis, a total of six themes in their travel dining experiences were identified. They were classified under the following six categories: as a means for novelty-seeking, as a means for sensory pleasure, as a peak tourist experience, as a symbol of authenticity, as a symbol of prestige and as a medium for cultural exploration. The study also found that Buddhist temple cuisine, as a cultural resource, can be a good example of an experience-based tourist attraction.