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THERELUCTANT GOURMET

Root to health

POT OF GOODNESSMint rice is good for the heart and balances vata and kapha

It's a classic case of the wheatgrass on the other side being greener. Most of us are familiar with the basics of Ayurvedic cooking. After all, it's ingrained in Indian food habits: kichadi for queasiness, tulsi chai for colds, honey for almost everything.

However, thanks to the endless gush of glossy magazines, health websites and evangelistic blogs, we've been swept up in the Western world's ceaseless search for wonder foods, anti-ageing berries and miracle fat-burners. We've chased Acai from the Amazon, Googled obscure seaweed suppliers and stocked our fridges with lumpy Aloe Vera juices. I hate to break this to you. But, it looks like your grandmother is going to have the last laugh, even as she stirs her toor dal. (Turns out it strengthens muscles, and is also great for your skin, eyes, bones and joints.)

The world's slowly realising that Ayurveda has had the answers all along.

This month Jigyasa Giri and Prathiba Jain's glossy Sukham Ayu came in second, after Celebrity Chef Alain Ducasse and Paule Neyrat's book, Nature at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards (a sort of Oscars for the food world) in Paris. Prathiba and Jigyasa say their presentation and book kindled an interest in Ayurveda at the fair, capturing the imagination of everyone from high profile chefs to fellow writers (who are currently experimenting with daliya upma in their respective countries.)

Based on research at KARE (Kerala Ayurvedic and Rejuvenation Establishment), a retreat in the Sahyadri range of the Western Ghats, Sukham Ayu's advantage is its articulate, inviting, glossy presentation of Ayurvedic principles and recipes. Although India's got many very well-qualified and talented doctors and experts on the subject, most books on Ayurvedic food are badly written and produced, making Ayurveda seem obscure, boring and distinctly unfashionable. But, is it essential to make everything as sleek as the Gossip Girl's cast, you ask? Let's be honest — in this day and age, absolutely. Capturing people's imaginations is the most effective way to influence them, whether you're preaching a return to organic cotton, surya namaskars or spinach soup.

Jigyasa and Prathiba met chefs from the prestigious Cordon Bleu, as well as culinary consultants who spoke about the need to infuse Ayurvedic insights into international cuisines and ways of eating.

Not surprisingly, all Ayurveda's ideas tie in perfectly with those of Slow Food, the eco-gastronomic movement founded to promote good, clean, fair food.

As it's poised to capture the world, Ayurvedic food is gradually breaking out of the confines of spas and ashrams. The Park, Chennai, for instance offers an appropriately glammed-up version of authentic Ayurvedic food, listing “Fenugreek dusted chicken on a cumin scented chickpea mash” or “Cilantro and spring vegetable cous cous, grilled plantain and broken wheat kheer with jaggery”. Executive Chef Rajesh, who says they developed it in consultation with their in-house Ayurvedic doctor, states that non-vegetarian additions are inevitable, even if they seem to contradict traditional rules. After all, the science is now going global.

Amazon lists a rush of books written over the last few years on the subject. Ayurvedic Cooking for Westerners by Amadea Morningstar, for instance, offers recipes that seem a world away from familiar Indian Ayurveda: banana peach muffins, hot blue cornmeal and honey tapioca. In the Sattwa Café book, Meta B. Doherty attempts to create a menu that will appeal to globalised Australia, so it includes baked rice and vine leaves, buckwheat besan crepes and even donuts in rose syrup.

Of course, there's still plenty to choose from right within Indian food. Vasant Lad and Usha Lad's Ayurvedic Cooking for Self Healing lists a reassuring variety of delicious food, all listed with their individual health benefits. Steaming kokum soup for skin rashes, sizzling vegetable pakoras for ‘balance' and creamy poppy seed kheer for inducing sleep.

There's nothing quite as gratifying as treating illness with comfort food. After all, wrapping yourself in a quilt and drinking chai fragrant with fresh ginger is so much more satisfying than popping yet another foul pill.

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