Dear Sangeeta,
It’s so great to connect with you. When I came to know about you and your blog I got more excited. And when you said you will do a guest post with me, I danced in private. I can’t tell you how excited I am. I even told my friends to send me their questions so I can ask Sangeeta 🙂
Thank you so much and I am glad I connected with you too. Always great to know like minded people and learn from each other. Our blog help us achieve that 🙂
Before you start, a little bit about storyofcooks. I am Bengali by birth. I lived 25 years of life in Kolkata where I ate only food prepared by mom. I always had a bad tendency of gaining weight so she always cooked healthy yet delicious recipes for me. When I came to The States, I started gaining weight by eating at my college cafeteria. Then I started cooking on my own. Before I realized what was happening it become my hobby and passion. Now I am married and my husband loves spicy food. So cooking becomes much more exciting for me.
I work 8-5 most weekdays so I hardly get any time to cook. Also, as I sit at my desk most of the time, gaining weight is not very hard for me. 😀 When I spoke with my friends, I found it’s a common problem for many of us. We gain weight as soon as we start working, which is why I started my blog. I believe in eating healthy yet delicious food.
Many people like me have so many questions about food and healthy eating. Here is a couple of questions I gathered.
1. Please tell me about your blog and the reason behind Healthy living with Sangeeta Khanna.
The reason I started this blog (healthfooddesivideshi.com, Healthy Living with Sangeeta Khanna is my fb page) was that I always cooked simple healthy food for myself and found that everyone who eats at my place asks for recipes and generally likes the food. Many people I knew had no idea you can eat healthy with limited cooking skills and a limited budget too. I wanted to clear the myth that healthy food is expensive and cooking good food is too laborious a process. I started writing recipes for friends initially, there were no pictures in the beginning, the writing was very casual but later as I saw a good feedback coming my way I started putting in more effort into my blogs.
2. What do you consider as healthy eating?
Healthy eating involves all real and whole food that is cooked to preserve nutrients. Staying away from processed foods and home cooking is desirable, cooking and eating food according to what our body needs is crucial and we can positively treat almost all metabolic disorders by eating healthy.
3. I read somewhere that a Breakfast should be the healthiest meal of the day. How can someone prepare or choose a healthy breakfast? I mean what options do I have given that I get 10 minutes to make a breakfast.
Yes a good breakfast can make your day energetic and fruitful and a badly chosen breakfast can make your healthy eating plans go out of the window. To prepare a healthy breakfast every single day you need to be prepared. That means you need to stock fresh vegetables and fruits, nuts, dairy, eggs and whole grain cereals etc and do a prep the night before. Like if you soak buckwheat groats or amaranth seeds in milk along with some chopped nuts and dried fruits, you can microwave the bowl for 5 minutes and your breakfast is ready. It can be even quicker if you grab a banana, a glass of whole milk or home made yogurt with chopped fruits and nuts. Or one can cook in batches and freeze, reheat and eat the breakfast as desired. I find idlis and dosas quite quick if you have made the chutney and batter beforehand.
4. Is tea/coffee good? If yes how many cups should we drink a day? I use sugar substitutes in my tea because I want to cut some calories there. Is it healthy?
I don’t find too much of a problem with a couple of cups of coffee or tea. Brewed tea is always better and coffee should be limited to 2 cups and one needs to take care of iron and calcium supplementation if one is a regular tea and coffee drinker. Sugar free must be avoided at all costs. All sugar substitutes are addictive, you can try and make a habit of minimal sugar in your beverages if you want them sweet.
5. I hate exercise. Though I prefer walking. What kind of exercise can I do to keep myself fit given that I have only 30 minutes a day.
If you have only 30 minutes a day I would rather prefer some squats, lunges and planks. Add weights if you can.Walking is for leisure.
6. When I see my friends start dieting, the first thing they do is – start eating salad/soup and discard Indian foods. Why do I have to stop eating the food I grew up eating and eat the bland salad?
I believe the most satiating food is the one we grew up eating. And we have so many home cooked Indian foods that are absolutely healthy. I know restaurants serve horrible Indian food all around the globe but one can try and cook healthy home style Indian food and eat perfectly healthy.
7. How can someone make Indian foods healthy? I mean, is there any different cooking technique we should follow? Indian foods are full of oil most of the time. How can we reduce oil in a recipe?
There are hoards of Indian recipes that involve steaming and stewing, many of our curries are simple and healthy. Many traditional foods like makki ki roti sarson ka saag, rajma chawal, machher jhol and rice, idli, dosa etc are absolutely healthy. We have meat stews and steamed fish in leaf parcels in almost all Indian cuisines. I don’t agree that Indian recipes are full of oil, unless they are deep fried.
Slow cooking helps with reducing oil in a recipe. I have even posted deep fried recipes where the food absorbs very little oil. Like if you microwave a kachori or a pakoda mix for a few seconds and fry it is hot oil immediately it acts like flash frying and the food hardly absorbs any oil. I always suggest that everyone should take interest in the kitchen, learn cooking so one knows what one is eating. It goes a long way when you know what goes into your plate.
8. Is there any good diet book or blog we should follow?
I would say just read my blog and see how it inspires you to cook healthy and enjoy doing that, I am aware it sounds like shameless self promotion but I get this feedback from my readers. I have never followed any diet book so I can’t suggest that, but google helps a lot when you want to eat healthy. You can always search for an ingredient being healthy or unhealthy, or how to cook with the ingredient in the best possible way.
9. Tell me how a person can be healthy? I mean, is loosing weight everything? Or are there some other factors too?
I feel really sad when people associate weight and shape of the body with health. Shape of the body in vogue keep changing but health parameters don’t. Extreme obsession with being thin is really harmful and one must realise that when you start eating to nourish your body and keep working out regularly, your body rewards you with good health as well as optimal shape that your body is blessed with genetically.
10. What is the ideal diet to lose weight without starving? Is eating rice healthy? People say that you should ban rice when you are dieting.
Ideal diet would be different for different people. I believe in personalised diet patterns based on lifestyle, the cuisine one has grown up eating and where one lives at present to see what seasonal local ingredients they get. Diets are no thumb rule that works for all.
Rice is healthier that wheat, fermented rice foods like idli and dosa etc are even better as they provide additional nutrients. The key is to limit your grains according to your activity level. You can’t eat much grains if you have a sedentary lifestyle.
Bonus question: I recently read an article that a woman can get a heart-attack in their 30s even if they are lean or athletic. How can we avoid that? Is there any kind of lifestyle we have to change? Is there any kind of test we should do every year?
Women or men both can get a heart attack in early age even when they look athletic. The reason is the inflammation level in the body that goes undetected at early age. Use of processed foods and refined cooking oils is the culprit here mostly, but it can also be because of a lifestyle that involves too much stress, too little nourishment (in terms of micro nutrients), and inflammation in body tissues (including blood vessels).
