Contemporary critics acknowledged that the minceur versions by Guérard tasted better and were less filling than their nouvelle cuisine originals.
[1] In the 1960s, along with Paul Bocuse, Alain Chapel, and Jean and Pierre Troisgros, "Guérard was a nouvelle cuisine pioneer who ... disrupted restaurant culture ...
Breaking away from the long-established rules of French haute cuisine, the group pushed for food to look and taste more like the stuff it’s actually made from, to be leaner and lighter and brighter.
The spas were for health benefits and his creation - cuisine minceur - became the logical avenue for his new form of low-calorie cooking.
Guerard stated he created "great slimming cuisine" when he moved to Eugénie in 1974, an area where patients with metabolic diseases used its hot springs.