Apathya : What is to be avoided ?

Apathya

         

          In today’s scenario of fast life style, it is becoming very difficult day by day to restrict the busy people about their diets.  Increasing development of false or partial true concepts under modern dietetics is another big problem in front of society, due to which ancient concepts, which are really complete and great are lagging in their application in day to day life. So, there is a big list according to our great science i.e. ayurveda, containing literally thousands of food remedies under the heading ‘Apathya’ i.e. the foods not to be taken as daily habit. But the scenario is that the common people are totally unaware of this apathya, as false concepts of calorie based system diet is only known to them and they are unaware of ayurvedic concepts of pathya and apathya that means what is to be consumed and what is to be avoided. The menu cards of maximum hotels and restaurants, are really apathya, the food items of which are highly preferred by our people. If we read the previous list of pathya given in this blog in older post, we can assume this truth. The raw material which is used for preparing this food is not of trustable quality. The raw material includes grains, cereals, oils, chilly, salt, sugar, masala, water, vegetables, fruits, milk products, food colors, preservatives, drying agents and hundreds of other items. For collecting and selecting each raw material mentioned above, there are specific rules. No one is obeying these rules, but just ignoring these as if a very simple negligible one. But, there is a very close and big relation among use of these materials and health. Rules have prepared for considering overall health. What are the rules ? It is very big list which is very difficult to share in single blog post. There are separate rules for each of the above though some common rules are there. But for sake of understanding, some of them will be discussed here. Grains like wheat, rice and cereals like mung, tur and others, there is a rule that these should be yielded in good land i.e. free from chemical prolusion. These should be used after one year of its production in farm. These should be well dried and well washed before current use. These should be processed according to ones constitution and disease. For example if we want to make some rice item, raw rice grains which are to be used, should be one year old at least. These should be well washed. These should be fried in pan for making them light and for removing extra water from grains. These should be well cooked by adding 14 times water in it. The extra water should be allowed to go and should be separated. Thus prepared rice should be used for preparing any rice item. Depending on process to which it undergoes, it becomes heavy and difficult to digest. These are some rules for just one grain i.e. rice. Considering contains like vitamins and minerals only, we are ignoring other these factors, which are important one. Just think, if anybody thinks about the washing out of vitamins only in above said method of rice preparation, and ignores other rules then he should ask a question to himself that does he eating a vitamin or he is eating rice. If rice means vitamins only and nothing more than that then it is better to eat a tablet containing specific vitamins. But, the case is that we have to think about rice as a whole and not about the separate constituents only. We must think the overall impact of any food material on overall body and not only on specific single organ or system. Apathya is very broad concept. Only certain food items could not be listed as apathya. Merely name of food item could not be titled as apathya. There are number of criterions on which it is decided that the food is pathaya or apathya. Type of raw food, from where it is collected, When  it is collected, how it is stored,  processes, time, methods of preparation, the co products along with it is to be consumed, the season in which we are eating, the time of day or night we are eating, The disease or constituent of consuming person, state of digestive system, state of mind  and so on.  A simple curd becomes apathy when we consume in night. Same is pathya of day time. Here time is the factor deciding the pathya or apathy. So, depending on food there are certain deciding rules. Thus it is not actually possible to give a specific list of apathya which is common to all. But for sake of understanding some examples will be quoted in future posts.