Hello there! Here I'm again with an interesting blog. Here I'm going to share 4 kitchen products that you should throw away immediately. These products are used in our day to day routine and their long term effect is harming our health at a serious level. It's high time we must consider such parameters to improve our health.  I'm sure that all of us are using at least 2 out of these 4 products on a daily basis. 

Here we will discuss why these products are unhealthy and how easily we can switch to their healthier alternatives.

4 Kitchen Products That are Unhealthy for Health and their Healthier Alternatives

1. Coffee

Where many studies highlight the health benefits of coffee , we should not ignore the side effects of it.

Coffee may bring many side effects like 

• Insomnia
• Hinders absorption of zinc
• Robs calcium off the bones
• sleep disturbance
• Restlessness
• Headache
• Dizziness
• Fast heart rate
• Dehydration
• Causes dependency

It is because coffee contains caffeine. Of course decaffeinated coffee is now available in the supermarkets  but the commercial process by which the coffee is decaffeinated makes use of many harmful chemicals like methylene chloride. Moreover, it is yet not hundred percent caffeine free. 

So does it mean you will have to get over the taste of coffee? certainly not. Mother nature gives us a plant whose roots when dried, roasted and grinded into fine powder, tastes like coffee .It has no caffeine and has no side effects also, Rather it has many health benefits like it is antifungal, antiviral, antibacterial, anticarcinogenic, antioxidative and immune stimulating. 

 

It is roasted chicory powder. Sounds new? Well it isn't .

The famous filter coffee of south India uses a blend of chicory and coffee beans to give it a thick texture, enhance its taste and improve the overall health quotient. 

Being a natural prebiotic, rich in manganese, potassium,  vitamin B6 and fibres, it improves digestion, controls blood sugar and also helps to cut extra fat. 

To make it, in a pan at low flame, add 100 ml water, 100 ml milk and one fourth teaspoon of chicory powder. Once it gets boiled properly, turn off the gas and add natural sweetener and strain to enjoy the chicory coffee. 

The chicory coffee is taste wise similar to coffee and  even price wise where 100g of regular coffee costs 250 rupees, 100g of chicory powder costs 150 rupees. Totally worth a switch. 

While purchasing chicory powder, make sure the product contains only one ingredient which is 100% roasted chicory powder. 

As for the remaining coffee lying in your kitchen, Use it as a de-tan mask or as a skin exfoliator. 

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2. Papad

Papad is an inseparable part of Indian meals. It is a natural appetiser, adds crunch to a meal and makes you feel fuller faster. 

Well is this true for the papads we find in markets nowadays? Not really. 

Instead of using the traditional way of making papads, brands nowadays use faster ways to make papads which saves time, saves effort and fills their pocket. However these fast methods not only reduce the health benefits of papad but also bring side effects along with themselves.  

Many brands use low quality refined oil, preservatives or maida (wheat flour) to make papad. Ask your grandmother and she will tell you that if dried well in sunlight, papad need no preservatives. 

Papad has the power to transform the taste of a meal but using these papads on a daily basis can lead to serious health issues. 

Throw these away and switch to something better. Yes, one of these brands makes papads which are healthier and even tastier among all. It's the famous Lijjat papad. This papad contains no preservatives or other harmful ingredients . This is why it has a shelf life of only 3 months which is much lesser than its other competitors. They would have completely added the traditional way of making the papad. So switch to Lijjat Papad and add crunch to your meal guilt free. 

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3. Table sugar

Being devoid of nutrients, promoter of various health issues and eight times more addictive than cocaine.

Side effects of table sugar are 

• Can lead to heart diseases 
• Can make the organs fat
• Havoc with cholesterol level 
• Addictive
• Makes you depressed
• Disables your appetite control

Table sugar is among the worst food products ever created. It is sad and shocking that it still finds a place in the kitchen of a lot of people. 

But not every sugar is created alike. Even though the raw material is sugar cane for every type of sugar, it is about the processing and the use of Sulphur and other type of chemicals  that renders table sugar acidic and harmful to health while jaggery, jaggery powder and thread mishri are alkaline, full of nutrients and hence beneficial for the body. 

Well the brands and supermarkets now came up with a new gimmick- Sulphur free sugar. Well it is just like the old wine in a new bottle. Even if Sulphur is not used, many other harmful chemicals are used in its refining. 

There are some constraints for unrefined sweeteners too, like one may not like jaggery powder for tea, thread mishri is healthy and apt but it needs to be grounded into powder before you add it to food. 

So why not switch to another unrefined, nutritious and chemical free sweetener alternative which is extracted in powder form which is Indian traditional Desi khand .

To make Indian traditional desi khand , first on a low flame, sugarcane juice is boiled , then the Okra pulp is added to filter out the impurities and then it is heated further and with the help of centrifugation, the raw sugar crystals are separated from it. Then this mixture is sun dried well and packed as natural khandsari sugar. 

This natural Khand retains a little molasses which is why its colour is off white . However some manufacturers Temper the natural process and they add a harmful chemical Sodium hydrosulphite in place of the Okra pulp and some even add the powdered sugar during the boiling process of sugarcane juice. It yields more Khand and the colour produced is also whitish but has the residue of that dangerous chemical. 

So next time you buy Khand from the market, don't go for a cheaper product and make sure it is a bit yellowish. Just use this natural unrefined sweetener guilt free in making of teas, sweets or whatever else you want. 

You can also use the raw sugar you have already, as a scrub for your skin. Just mix it with lemon juice and use it as a natural scrub. But for food purposes, stick to the unrefined sugar. 

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4. Pressure cooker

Pressure cookers are used in every kitchen nowadays. Well a French physicist invented a pressure cooker with only one intention and that is to cook faster. No doubt how much nutrients are left behind is debatable.

Nowadays people use non-stick cookers or the cooker made up of aluminium. Teflon coated non-stick cooker produces toxic fumes when heated which is harmful for health and aluminium is a thyrotoxic metal which gets leached into the food and leads to problems like hair fall and thyroid. 

So it is better to get back to our traditional ways to cook food in brass or clay pots as suggested in Ayurveda. No doubt slowly cooked food is best for our health but considering today's fast and busy lifestyle, if you can't do without a pressure cooker, at least change its material. 

Avoid non-stick or aluminium cookers. Stainless steel is a better choice. Studies show that it leaches the heavy materials like chromium and nickel but the harm is not as much as to cause health issues.  

On the other hand, brass cookware has been time tested and 100% safe as long as they are coated with tin. Tin coated brass cookers are easily available in the market. Usually it requires tin coating or Kalai once a year. Considering they're pricey but how long they last is what gives you the answer. Even if you sell back the brass cooker you'll get half of its price. It is totally worth a switch. 

So its high time we must avoid non-stick cookers and aluminium cookers and at least switch to the stainless steel cookers. 

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So these were some kitchen products that must be switched to their healthier alternatives. For your convenience I mentioned the link of the products that I recommended in the article as below-

Roasted Chicory Powder (option 1 - Rs 590/1kg) - https://amzn.to/3y1nJ9T Roasted Chicory Powder (option 2 - Rs 197/200g) - https://amzn.to/3ym8EjB Roasted Chicory Powder (option 3 - Rs 98/100g) - https://amzn.to/3ChimpA Roasted Chicory Powder (option 4 - Rs 479/1kg) - https://amzn.to/3E0gzX6 Lijjat Papad (All flavours - Rs 252/4x200g) - https://amzn.to/3Rm7MC1 Lijjat Udad dal papad (Rs 64/200g) - https://amzn.to/3fmudtw Lijjat Moong dal papad (Rs 70/200g) - https://amzn.to/3SmdZiv Desi Khand (option 1 - Rs 199/900g) - https://amzn.to/3BPBgCr

Desi Khand (option 2 - Rs 420/3x1kg) - https://amzn.to/3rgxFsu Desi Khand (option 3 - Rs 212/900g) - https://amzn.to/3DZQcRa Desi Khand (option 4 - Rs 540/6x800g) - https://amzn.to/3Eh82zx Desi Khand (option 5 - Rs 565/6x500g) - https://amzn.to/3RiF8Sq Brass Cooker (option 1 - Rs 4800/3 Litres) -https://amzn.to/3ff5lDQ Brass Cooker (option 2 - Rs 5800/5 Litres) -https://amzn.to/3SDqPbZ Brass Cooker (option 3 - Rs 6000/5 Litres ) - https://amzn.to/3ffz8fG Brass Cooker (option 4 - Rs 6899/3 Litres ) - https://amzn.to/3LNpnl2

Note - It is my advice that you try buying a brass cooker offline as you may get it at a better price.

Stainless Steel Cooker (option 1 - Rs 2820/3 Litres) - https://amzn.to/3DUZH4e Stainless Steel Cooker (option 2 - Rs 3249/5 Litres) - https://amzn.to/3BQgBOS Stainless Steel Cooker (option 3 - Rs 2280/3 Litres) - https://amzn.to/3dMKfMX Stainless Steel Cooker (option 4 - Rs 1592/3 Litres) - https://amzn.to/3dPvQ2s Stainless Steel Cooker (option 5 - Rs 1499/5 Litres) -https://amzn.to/3y1oj7z