Rujuta Diwekar’s new book is all about intuitive eating with ghar ka khana at its core
When Rujuta Diwekar hands the gift hidden under her arm, she does not make it. Instead, she quietly detaches the bag on her lap and opens it for Sudha Murty. When Mounty plunges her hand into the bag, he surfaces with a pile of rice in hand which, as I learn later, only grows in rainwater and forest streams and was cultivated on the ancestral farm of Diwekar near Palghar, Maharashtra. Then, in the real Ghar Ka Khana Spirit, Mounty – an educator, author and philanthropist – Diwekar Offers a glass of homemade babeter to revive it after an early morning travel.
I take a mental note to ask her how she managed to sacrifice sleep and steal 1,000 kilometers without looking like a crumpled boarding pass. “The raisins soaked on Rising and Maska Pavent with coffee on the way,” she said later on WhatsApp. “It’s the secret.” She also has other secrets – like the way the best food advice does not come from a nutritionist but from your dadi or nani, or how Ghar Ka Khana may well be the ultimate superfood, no required fantasy label.
If there is one thing that Diwekar and Mounty have in common, it is their pursuit of a simple and balanced lifestyle. “It’s really common sense,” says Diwekar now, sitting in front of Mounty while Vogue cameras are starting to roll. “The best advice comes in your mother tongue. Lose a language, and you lose cooking – useful cuisine, and you lose happiness. Then we all become bad copies of each other. Authentic advice has no agenda, “she continues, reflecting on a world obsessed with biohacking, calories counting and restrictive regimes. Diwekar believes that the best meals should start and end at home and be sources of food rather than stress. This lies at the heart of the new Diwekar book, The common sense dietPosted by Juggernaut – A guide to eat well without thinking too much about each bite – the book she is here to share with Mountty and the world today.
“It is easy to abandon your own food simply because some imported superfoods have become viral. The truth is that you don’t even know who has approved it – their diet, their culture and their climate may not look like yours. Use social media, but don’t be used, ”says Diwekar. As a most sold health author in the country, which sold more than 1.75 million copies in its ten titles, Diwekar has long recommended an intuitive diet, free itself from food anxiety and trust traditional knowledge. “Growing up, my favorite dish was Varan Bhat, Limbu, Toop, Meeth [dal and rice with a pinch of lemon, ghee, and salt]. It’s fast and easy, and I even love it now. It is a full meal for a woman who works, ”explains Diwekar, whose list of star customers includes Alia Bhatt, Gautam Gambir and Bhavish Aggarwal.
