Add coconut magic to your diet

On Sunday, when fitness instructors Raj Ganpath and Arvind Ashok took to the stage to thrash seed and vegetable oils as problems of the Indian diet, little did one expect that Coconut oil would be hailed as the best bet. “Seed and vegetable oils are extremely unstable. When cooked, their chemical bonds break and they release free radicals,” Arvind explained, saying that the regular Indian diet had a lot of polyunsaturated oils. Contrary to popular belief, Arvind informed that Olive oil, even the one that is commonly considered safe for Indian cooking, might not be the best option because of the same problem of instability. “Coconut oil or similar saturated or monounsaturated oils are the safest options for cooking,” he said. The next best option to cooking in coconut oil or ghee/ butter is cooking on a low-flame. Coconuts, Arvind added, were nothing short of magical. “Coconuts are rich in lauric acid, which is known for being antiviral, antibacterial and anti-fungal,” Raj explained.   And if your heart skipped a beat at the thought of cooking with ghee or butter, Raj explains that fat, like any other nutrient, is also essential. “Nothing is naturally low fat. Imagine how much processing must go into something to make it low fat!” he said. One has to have calories in their diet. Raj explained it in simple terms, “If you don’t have enough calories, you will get hungry, and eat more. Low fat diets are just the result of someone saying that fat is bad.”This was at an expert interactive experience session called ThinkRealFood, organised by the newest fitness outfit of the city, The Quad. “Since the Indian diet is completely grain-based, it’s skinny on all other nutrients – vitamins, proteins, minerals. This is why India is the country with the highest incidence of  diabetes and cardiovascular diseases,” explained Raj, who runs The Quad along with Arvind Ashok. Wheat- The real deal Who can imagine a life without the convenient and soft chapattis for dinner, or no biscuits to dip in that afternoon coffee? You might want to start thinking about it, because consumption of wheat might not be so good for your gut, after all, said Arvind. Consumption of wheat destroys the vili in the small intestine. Vili are what helps one absorb the nutrients from the food consumed. “If the vili are destroyed, the person will lose the ability to absorb any nutrition and that can lead to various gut-related issues such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome,” explained Arvind. Almost 90 percent of the population is prone to some sort of wheat reaction and this will not be evident unless you get yourself tested. “The only way to do this is by staying off wheat for six weeks. Reintroduce wheat in your system and if you have reactions, it means that you are allergic to it and it is causing your gut some problems. Stay off wheat, explained Arvind. And there is no better example than Raj himself. “I had been suffering from Asthma all my life and as soon as I cut out gluten (a protein composite found in foods processed from wheat and related grain species) from my diet, it disappeared,” he said.