"Slow" food

Lately near Stuttgart there was a trade fair on the topic "slow food". First of all, I had to ask the question what on earth "slow food" is and what it is good for. So I've been told that in this fast world of timetables and deadlines people don't take time to cook and eat properly anymore, they rather prefer fast food. Well, even I have heard of fast food in the past few years, whereas "slow food" is something very new to me. "Slow food", people said to me, is just the opposite of fast food. People taking time to eat, and people taking time to prepare the meal. Healthy and delicious menus prepared by dedicated women and men, and people enjoying the delights of lovely prepared meals.
Sounds good to me, but what is new about this? Isn't that just normal food? Simply food? That's what mum used to cook for us every day after school, when we came home. No fast food, just food. Why does it need a new name now? Why can't it just be called "food" as it used to be?
It has to be "slow food" so people these days actually know what you're talking about, because fast food has taken over the world and has become every day food for most. And our governments boost neologisms like this to make us believe that things, which used to be ordinary to us, every-day things now seem to us like something special, so we are greatful to have it every now and then.