Sharjah: Fat is good, slim Indian actress Shilpa Shetty told fans at the Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF) on Thursday night.
Shetty, 41, was explaining the health benefits of clarified butter and other fat-rich foods, which she said were essential for good health, if consumed responsibly.
The health tip was among many she shared during a talk on her new book, The Great Indian Diet: Busting the Big Fat Myth, co-authored by ‘holistic nutritionist’ Luke Coutinho.
The book draws attention to what it describes as tasty and nutritious Indian meals that support good health, while playing down the perceived need for diet plans imported from the West.
Shetty, while answering questions from fans on Thursday at SIBF, said she sees no harm in a balanced approach to clarified butter, which is hugely popular in India.
The fitness fanatic revealed that she has a tablespoon of clarified butter every day. Dieting, she added, is commonly misunderstood. She detailed how she managed to lose, in four months, the 32kg she had gained when she had her first child. She said the book was a “payback” to people like her who had gained lots of weight and who constantly ask how she stays fit.
Shetty said people 70 years ago led healthier lives not least because of a more natural diet.
“They didn’t get scared of coconut oil and ghee [clarified butter], and they did not make their food in olive oil, especially the Indians. Please stop doing that. Why [must you only cook with olive oil]? You have [US singer] Madonna who is using clarified butter, which is ghee, on her toast!” she said.
Shetty said other celebrities use clarified butter and coconut oil — “things that all of us Malayalis and Bengalis [communities in India] have lived on all our lives. And then suddenly the value of that coconut oil and ghee has gone up. Why do we need a foreigner to remind us of what we have in our culture, of something that is so close to us. Do not underestimate the value of what is home-grown”.
However, she pointed out that “it depends what you’re doing with that ghee, how you’re eating it. I have a tablespoon of ghee every afternoon. I have my brown rice or my white rice with ghee and my daal [lentils] or my chicken or my fish curry. I cannot eat rice without my ghee… Now if you’re frying your food in ghee, that’s the wrong thing. Indian food is actually very simple to cook. If you see our daals — our lentils — there’s just a chalk of ghee, you know, it’s just tempered with ghee… Obviously everything has to be eaten in limited quantities.”
She added: “I’ve practised living healthy for all my life. And when I say healthy, it doesn’t mean ‘oh, diet khana [food] — no sugar, no oily food. It’s not like that. You have to maintain a balance, right? And that’s exactly what we’ve tried to say in The Great Indian Diet. You don’t have to be austere and not go out and not enjoy. You can do that, but do not make it a pattern. The only thing you should make a pattern is living healthy. And that is very easy to do, my friends.”
The 35th edition of SIBF ends on Saturday at Expo Centre Sharjah. It is featuring over 1.5 million books this year and dozens of famous authors, celebrities and cultural activities.
