The real superfood is in your kitchen

In his first book, Gurpareet Bains makes a simple point, and thankfully, unlike other food/diet books, doesn’t spend 2000 pages to get to it — the right food can prevent even cancer, ‘superfoods’ are “not only the exotic shrink-wrapped foods found schmoozing in the health and chilled sections of supermarkets” but those found in your kitchen.

Indian Superfood is the 31-year-old chef and nutritionalist’s attempt to let people know that Indian food doesn’t acquire its taste merely by adding dollops on ghee (an association most of UK makes with the cuisine, says Bains). Mix Indian spices, vegetables and fruits to an optimum amount and you can get the world’s healthiest vegetarian/chicken curry in 45 minutes, without being heavy on fat.

Interestingly, you needn’t know secret formulae to do this either — there is none. Bains’ book is based on research widely available on the internet. “In 2007, I came across a study by the US Department of Agriculture that said one must consume a minimum of 3000 ORAC units per day for optimum health, whereas an average person consumes only 1200.

The ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) value is the scientific measurement of the antioxidant capacity of foods and spices. Foods higher on the ORAC scale neutralise free radicals more effectively.

“There was all the information one ever needs to prevent hospital visits for lifestyle ailments. It was so simple — cinnamon has 2,67,536 ORAC values per 100g, turmeric has 1, 59, 277, walnuts 13, 541 and lentils 7282. Imagine what you can do if you just combine them right. You don’t take away the ‘flavour’ from your food, you add so much of it,” says Bains.

Bains book includes a directory of superfoods, superspices and all their ORAC values. The recipes are divided into breakfast, lunch, dinner, sides, light bites, cocktails and refreshments and dessert.

“Since we are keeping the fat content low, too, there are substitutions you can make to any old recipe and make it healthy,” says Bains. Just as your ears snap to attention at the word substitution (when was substituting, say butter, ever a good thing?), Bains explains further.

“To make samosas, for instance, you can use rice paper, mashed potatoes and bean sprouts instead of the regular filling. The healthy version of halwa uses cashews, ginger or cinnamon, dried dates, cranberries and goji berries.” Thank God for that.