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If you love laddus, let them go
Esha Mahajan, TNN - Oct 12, 2011, 01.31AM IST
NEW DELHI: The Navratra fervour has died down and so has the austerity that marks the festivity. As Diwali celebrations pick up pace, sweets are eaten with relish. And with the palate and tradition to egg us on, most of us down many more laddus and barfis than are good for us. The result: indigestion, weight gain, raised blood sugar and worse.
Consuming a lot of sweets has a hormonal impact on the body, and can cause related disorders like PCOD ( Polycystic Ovarian Disease) among young women. High intake of sugar can cause lethargy, and since it also increases appetite, people tend to eat more. And the binge continues well after Diwali - sugar aggravates the appetite for more sugar. Weight gain due to sweets can also trigger depression, says Dr Ishi Khosla, a clinical nutritionist.
While free indulgence of the sweet tooth is an invitation to disease, even a seemingly moderate intake of festive sweets can result in unexpected weight gain. For a person who weighs about 70kg, just four pieces of boondi laddus can easily add half a day's calorie requirement, says fitness expert Raghav Pande.
And a preemptive exercise regimen wonat make amends for the festive excess. asPeople try to compensate by working out more and eating healthy before the festive season, but they donat realize that calorie burning needs to be a continuous process. A week of healthy living cannot compensate for bingeing later on, says fitness consultant Sunil Kumar Bisht.
Visible changes like weight gain are the least sinister of sweetsa ill-effects. Doctors say traditional cooking methods produce harmful byproducts in sweets. Most sweets are deep-fried. Cooking at high temperatures for so long reduces the nutritional benefits of ingredients such as milk and nuts. Apart from significantly increasing the calorie content, deep-frying also changes the nature of fats, producing more saturated fat, which is unhealthy for the body. Furthermore, constant reheating of the same batch of oil produces cancer-causing substances, says nutritionist Anshul Jaibharat.
Adulteration of ingredients like milk and ghee has always made headlines around Diwali. Unfortunately, the adulterants used nowadays go beyond water, corn starch and vanaspati. Many sweets contain carcinogenic preservatives like formalin, which can cause asthma attacks, and damage the liver and the kidneys. The silver foil used to garnish sweets is made of aluminium, which is also harmful, says nutritionist Sushmita Goswami.
As awareness about the hazards of bingeing on sweets spreads, many people have started changing the rules of the festive season by giving dry fruits as gifts, or not accepting sweets from others. Even when we do receive sweets, we keep just a few boxes for prasad after Diwali puja, and give away the rest, says Rajpreet Kaur, who works with a non-governmental organization.
source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...e-laddus-let-them-go/articleshow/10319638.cms
Esha Mahajan, TNN - Oct 12, 2011, 01.31AM IST
NEW DELHI: The Navratra fervour has died down and so has the austerity that marks the festivity. As Diwali celebrations pick up pace, sweets are eaten with relish. And with the palate and tradition to egg us on, most of us down many more laddus and barfis than are good for us. The result: indigestion, weight gain, raised blood sugar and worse.
Consuming a lot of sweets has a hormonal impact on the body, and can cause related disorders like PCOD ( Polycystic Ovarian Disease) among young women. High intake of sugar can cause lethargy, and since it also increases appetite, people tend to eat more. And the binge continues well after Diwali - sugar aggravates the appetite for more sugar. Weight gain due to sweets can also trigger depression, says Dr Ishi Khosla, a clinical nutritionist.
While free indulgence of the sweet tooth is an invitation to disease, even a seemingly moderate intake of festive sweets can result in unexpected weight gain. For a person who weighs about 70kg, just four pieces of boondi laddus can easily add half a day's calorie requirement, says fitness expert Raghav Pande.
And a preemptive exercise regimen wonat make amends for the festive excess. asPeople try to compensate by working out more and eating healthy before the festive season, but they donat realize that calorie burning needs to be a continuous process. A week of healthy living cannot compensate for bingeing later on, says fitness consultant Sunil Kumar Bisht.
Visible changes like weight gain are the least sinister of sweetsa ill-effects. Doctors say traditional cooking methods produce harmful byproducts in sweets. Most sweets are deep-fried. Cooking at high temperatures for so long reduces the nutritional benefits of ingredients such as milk and nuts. Apart from significantly increasing the calorie content, deep-frying also changes the nature of fats, producing more saturated fat, which is unhealthy for the body. Furthermore, constant reheating of the same batch of oil produces cancer-causing substances, says nutritionist Anshul Jaibharat.
Adulteration of ingredients like milk and ghee has always made headlines around Diwali. Unfortunately, the adulterants used nowadays go beyond water, corn starch and vanaspati. Many sweets contain carcinogenic preservatives like formalin, which can cause asthma attacks, and damage the liver and the kidneys. The silver foil used to garnish sweets is made of aluminium, which is also harmful, says nutritionist Sushmita Goswami.
As awareness about the hazards of bingeing on sweets spreads, many people have started changing the rules of the festive season by giving dry fruits as gifts, or not accepting sweets from others. Even when we do receive sweets, we keep just a few boxes for prasad after Diwali puja, and give away the rest, says Rajpreet Kaur, who works with a non-governmental organization.
source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...e-laddus-let-them-go/articleshow/10319638.cms
