Impact of micro cuisine in Indian Food

 I recently came across the phrase micro cuisine (sometimes referred to as niche cuisine but that terminology just doesn’t work for me) and have spent the past few weeks attempting to understand what exactly that means.  If you attempt to look up the phrase you will find that what you get is mostly stuff about microwave cooking. But micro cuisines are not about technology. When I travel I am most interested in local foods that are specific to the area I am in. I want to eat local, and hopefully foods I have never experienced and can’t get in my home countries of Canada or Ireland.



Effect Of Heat On The Nutrients

  • In carbohydrates, cooking has a beneficial effect as it leads to gelatinization of starch and caramelization of sugar which gives color and flavor to food.
  • Proteins get denatured thus access to enzymes and digestibility increases.
  • Moist heating of pulses improves protein quality.
  • Chemical reactions take place when oil is continuously heated. Reactions like hydrolysis, oxidation, and polymerization of the oil. Oil becomes dark and foamy, such an oil should not be used for consumption
  • Blanching inactivates certain enzymes that lead to undesirable browning.
  • Heat labile vitamins are lost.
  • Fat-soluble vitamins are lost during fat frying if a product is not coated properly.

Effect Of Acid On Nutrients

  • An acidic medium while cooking helps to preserve water-soluble vitamins and retards enzymatic browning of certain fruits and vegetables.
  • Vegetables and pulses take a longer time to cook in an acidic medium as acids precipitate pectin and harden vegetables.
  • Vegetables lose their color, so to overcome this allow the volatile acids to escape first, hence greens should be cooked without lid for the first few minutes.

Guidelines For Preserving Nutrients

  • Wash vegetables, fruits and rice in just a sufficient amount of water. It is advisable either to cook in a minimum amount of water or to use the cooking water in soups and gravies.
  • Cutting vegetables to small pieces and exposing them to air before cooking leads to loss of vitamins particularly vitamin C. Thus it is advisable to cut large pieces and cook for a shorter period.
  • The 3 R’s of cooking to conserve nutrients are:
  1. Reduce the amount of water
  2. Reduce the length of the cooking period
  3. Reduce the amount of surface area exposed
  • Oil heated repeatedly should not be consumed as repeated heating during frying leads to the production of toxic substances due to pre-oxidation and rancidity.



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