Indian Daal: Heart-healthy food
Reported February 01, 2008
According to the American Heart Association, heart disease kills or disables more people than any other health condition. So what can families enjoy for dinner on the first Friday in February, known as Go Red for Women Day, a day people wear color red to raise awareness of women’s heart health?
Try a food that regularly fills the plates of Indian families every day — daal.
Daal can be made from a variety of lentils. The most commonly found lentils in the United States are either green or brown (masoor). Lentils may come whole or split like peas. Some remain firm and chewy and retain their shape, while others become soft and mushy. Flavors vary from color to color, but they generally cook up with a nutty taste.
Lentils pack a punch when it comes to heart health. High in both soluble and insoluble fiber, lentils help people who want to lose weight feel full without eating a lot of calories. Fiber in legumes also helps regulate blood sugar levels for diabetics and lower cholesterol. Because they are high in magnesium, too, lentils help the heart muscle relax and improve blood flow so more oxygen and nutrients circulate through the body.
These tiny legumes also provide protein and iron from a non-meat source, thereby providing energy without animal fats.
Yet the miracles of daal go beyond lentils’ health benefits; they involve spice and flavor as well. Sheetal Singh, who owns Saffron Fine Dining and Indian Cuisine in Kalamazoo with her husband, Channi, grew up learning about the health benefits of spice.
“My grandfather was an ayurvedic doctor,” (ayu meaning life, veda meaning knowledge). For thousands of years, ayurvedic doctors have used food and spices to treat disease. “He passed it all down,” she says.
One of the foods ayurvedic doctors use is curry. “Curry powder in the market is not just curry spice, but may also have turmeric, bay leaves, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, black pepper–all kinds of spices mixed and ground,” Singh notes. “What makes each curry different is the proportion of all these ingredients used.”
Curries contain one of ayurvedic medicine’s most important spices, turmeric. Turmeric contains curcumin, which has been shown by researchers to help with heart health and acts as an anti-inflammatory. Packed with antioxidants, turmeric helps prevent Alzheimer’s disease, and may improve cancers, allergies, asthma and HIV.
