Thoughts on Indian/American Diets

Below is part of an essay I wrote for my public health class--read if you wish!

Analyzing the diet and eating habits of Indians requires mention of Ayurvedic philosophy. The Ayurvedic goals of nutrition involve physical, mental, and spiritual health. A healthy physical body requires well-balanced meals and regular exercise. Ayurvedics profess what one eats becomes one’s mind. Likewise, the purity of food follows the purity of the inner nature to maintain spiritual wellbeing. These principles weave throughout Indian diet patterns.

            According to most Pune residents, Indians follow a typical eating schedule. At 6 am, Swapna takes her chai or as her father prefers, milk with turmeric powder, along with two biscuits. After a few yoga poses, she eats ladoo around 9:30 am. In the Ayurvedic tradition, lunch happens from 12:30 to 1 pm and features two chapattis, vegetables, dal, and rice. She has chai at 4 pm and a snack of poha (rice puffs with curry leaves) around 6:30. Dinner at 8 or 8:30 is the same as lunch with the addition of a “salad” or cold vegetable mixed with yogurt and/or nuts. Fergusson College studies responded similarly with all meal times within an hour of Swapna. One girl has four distinct meals with breakfast of pohe and chai at 8:30am, Swapna’s lunch menu with a dessert at 1:30pm, supper of chai with light snacks and fruits at 5 pm, and Swapna’s dinner menu at 9 pm. Another FC student eats her breakfast of an egg, 3 slices of bread and a cup of milk at 8 am, lunch at 2 pm, chai with biscuits at 4:30 pm and dinner at 9:30 pm featuring fruit. She replaces the 5 or 5:30 supper with an 11am snack of sandwiches or parathas. Overall, middle-aged and young Indians follow the same schedule, though the students eat bigger breakfast meals and take later lunches and dinners than Swapna.

            Meal timing in America certainly varies. I always eat a banana as soon as I wake up (around 6:15) and usually go to intense hot yoga or run before my usual breakfast of a whole-grain cereal or oatmeal, fruit, and usually some egg whites or peanut butter for protein (8:15). Midmorning for me usually means high-protein yogurt or some fruit. Right around 12:30, I usually enjoy a large salad loaded with beets, nuts, hearty greens like kale or spinach, other vegetables, and light vinaigrette. I’ll have a cinnamon rice cake or pretzels on the side, usually accompanied by fruit. Around 3 or 4 I like to have some coffee and another snack.  I usually eat dinner around 7. I enjoy a balanced protein, grain, and vegetable combination—for example, some brown rice, stir-fried tofu, and a side vegetable. I always have dessert, mostly frozen yogurt or dark chocolate. I typically eat something every 3-4 hours. Similarly, Swapna agrees that one should have four hours maximum in between meals. We disagree on what time to eat dinner. I have always been taught that 70% of daily calories should be consumed before 6pm and that eating after 8 pm is bad for health. Swapna and I agree that one should go to bed about 3 hours or more after eating and that eating after 9:30 pm leads to poor digestion.

            The meal times in India seem more rigid and regular among young and old alike, whereas more variation exists in American meal times. For example, many Americans skip breakfast and have late-night fast-food dinners. Part of this unhealthy and irregular meal pattern results from the busy lifestyles of many American working families.

            Indians eat for convenience less often than Americans, even as urbanization spreads the golden arches of McDonalds in India. There are certain things that should never be rushed, especially teatime. Chai seems to be an anytime beverage. Whether reading the morning newspaper, sari-shopping, printing copies at a Xerox shop, or visiting a neighbors’ flat, there is always an occasion for chai. Americans taking time to sit and enjoy a cup of tea is hard to imagine. Finding a “quick” chai or coffee to-go proves challenging in India. In drive-thru and convenience food-oriented America, one can be in and out with a piping cup of coffee within two minutes. I ordered a café latte at Café Coffee Day near Fergusson College between classes.  Fifteen minutes after my order, the confused server found a take-out cup and placed it in a plastic bag, still wondering why I couldn’t manage to sit down and drink it in the coffee shop.

            This anecdote reflects a fundamental difference between American and Indian culture in terms of convenience. One hardly sees people eating and walking on the go. In America, many skip breakfast in favor of power energy bars, eat on the morning commute, or at their desks. The amount of families that still come together for meals dwindles as American lifestyles grow busier. Luckily, my family eats home-cooked meals together most nights. While some Indian families have adopted a few frozen food dishes, homemade meals are prepared almost always. Perplexing to an outsider is the way in which businesses close for the lunch hour. Indians value sitting down for an hour mid-day for nourishment and rest. My hostel roommate, a coder in information technology, says her lunch can be taken for as long as she wants and whenever she wants as long as she works an 8-hour day. Where I interned at the U.S. Treasury Department this summer, we signed a statement that we would only take 30 minutes for lunch in spite of our 8-hour workday. I have noticed that few Indians bring their lunches to their jobs, however. Perhaps my college student budget motivated my decision to bring a large salad to work everyday, but many of my colleges brought their lunches as well, usually because there is little time in 30 minutes to leave the office and come back. Some colleagues would work through their lunches at their desks, determined to reach deadlines. My hostel-mate chooses to buy her lunch from the cafeteria since she can have homemade food at an inexpensive cost.

            There are also differences in the overall types of foods consumed. Most Americans consume too many calories and not enough nutrients. Many consume a diet low in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, and high in saturated fat, salt, and sugar. Two-thirds of Americans are obese and there are increasing risks for chronic diseases like heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and certain cancers. Something I’ve noticed is the amount of meat consumption in America. Many families consider meat the main course and the vegetables as small side dishes. As a vegetarian, I don’t personally cater to that philosophy and prefer to gain my proteins from beans, legumes, dairy, and nuts. Hence I was pleased to discover how often nuts are used in chutneys and sweets to add nutritious protein to the highly vegetarian diet of many Indians. Seeing PURE-VEG advertisements for restaurants comforts me as a former minority in a carnivore-based society. The same foods listed in the above typical Indian schedule do not vary much for lunch and dinner. The type of vegetable may change, but rice, dal, and chapatti are guarantees in the Maharashtran diet. Classifying food as “typically American” is a difficult task in light of Americna cultural diversity.

            Lots of extreme tastes like the very sweet and very spicy are popular in India. For example,  “black coffee” served without milk is loaded with sugar. The confections are sickeningly sweet. Some of the curries are also very spicy. Desserts and salad are served cold while the rest of the food is usually hot. Most Indians attempt to balance flavors; the sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and spicy should all marry together in a single meal.

            Along the same lines, the way in which meals are eaten, including the process and the portion sizes, differs from America. Everything eaten has a purpose: to enhance the skin or to calm the stomach or even to give thanks or prayer. Even sweets are mostly eaten at puja as offerings for the gods. Traditionally, some food used to be offered to a cow, a bird, and a starving person. Behaviorally, light conversation during meals is preferred. Swapna says most Indians do not talk during meals and instead concentrate on tasting the food and experiencing it. Too often in America, I’ll eat subconsciously, while watching a movie or chatting with friends and not realize my fullness. Interestingly, Swapna also says that it is important to have pure conversation without gossip when eating, since that kind of negative talk can be a pollutant to a nutritious meal. Instead, she was taught to thank the gods consciously in her head as she eats. While some Americans take a moment to say a blessing or grace before a meal, some don’t, and others rarely sit at a physical table to take a meal. Spiritual eating is less evident in America.

            Methods to eat illustrate proper Indian culture. The right hand is always used while utensils are hardly touched. Even the way a plate is arranged is very specific in India. The chapatti is always placed closest to the body. Rice is served above that. On the left, a cold side salad is dolloped along with a chutney while the right side features some kind of vegetable. On special occasions like Ganpati, special holiday foods are served. Muldoc replaces chapatti; rice with a little curd is eaten last as an offering to Lord Ganesha.  Traditions vary in America, but the special muldoc reminded me of traditional pumpkin pie being served on American thanksgiving. However, methods and orders for consumption are not defined as strictly in America. Indians rarely use napkins and are much better at keeping clothes free of stains, due to close eating over the plate as opposed to the American straight-backed style.

            Portion sizing seems to differ in India verses America. I was struck by the small size of my slice of birthday cake when we celebrated Preston’s birthday at the program center. In America, every piece of cake I’ve been served has been at least twice the size. Similarly, when I order a chai latte in America, it is five times as large as the shot-glass sized tea served by the street chaiwallas. Similarly, Indian desserts, while much sweeter than most of sweets I consume in America, are very small. At an American restaurant, the platters are as large as the silver, round trays used in India, but Indians do not cover their entire plate with food. American restaurants tend to serve 2-3 servings as a single one, meaning either one eats the entire thing or brings leftovers home. In my experiences, Indians prefer to eat everything they are served and leftovers are rare, since there is not usually excess food. For example, if there are left-over chapattis, they are ground into a breakfast dish for the next day.