You should consider reevaluating your purchases and their impact on your health if you rely on pre-packaged spice mixes or masalas in your kitchen. Here’s why! Singapore and Hong Kong have recently banned the sale of MDH and Everest masalas citing the presence of carcinogenic ethylene oxide in its spices. The spice blends under contention are MDH’s ‘Madras Curry Powder’, ‘Sambhar Masala Powder’, ‘Curry Powder’, and Everest’s ‘Fish Curry Masala’. Ethylene oxide is made from fossil fuels such as petroleum or natural gas, and is often used by spice manufacturers to lend a long shelf life to their ..read more

This is a sponsored article. On 14 April, 2024, at 5 am, the coast of Talaimannar in Sri Lanka was a bustling hub of activity. A team was busy checking arrangements and making sure all the documents and safety measures were in place. Amidst this flurry of activity, two men sat calm and composed, as they were about to attempt one of the most difficult challenges of their life — swimming across the Palk Strait. Their swim in the open ocean started shortly after 5 am, and Bharat Sachdeva and Shaaswat Sharma swam across the challenging 32 km stretch near the Ram Setu in 10 hours 30 minutes, non-st ..read more

Recently, Hong Kong and Singapore withdrew four spice mixes from popular Indian spice brands MDH Pvt Ltd and Everest Food Products Pvt Ltd, alleging the presence of carcinogenic ethylene oxide at levels surpassing permissible limits. Made from fossil fuels such as petroleum or natural gas, ethylene oxide is used to manufacture synthetic chemicals, polymers, plastics, pharmaceuticals, and detergents or fumigants. Often spice manufacturers use ethylene oxide to lend a long shelf life to their products. It is to be noted that the Food Safety and Standards of Authority India (FSSAI) doesn’t permit ..read more

Do store-bought masalas (spices) contain a cancer-causing substance?  After Hong Kong and Singapore placed four masalas from MDH and Everest under the scanner, food safety regulator FSSAI (Food Safety and Standards Authority of India) will now conduct quality checks on products of these two popular spice brands. On 5 April, Hong Kong’s food safety regulator, The Centre for Food Safety (CFS) found the presence of a pesticide, ethylene oxide in these masalas. The US EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) states that ethylene oxide is carcinogenic and can cause cancer through long-term exposu ..read more

The only motivation for me to wake up early on a Sunday morning is to eat my favourite butter masala dose or dosa with filtered coffee. The joint near my home in Bengaluru serves the most crispy and buttery dosas ever! This love affair with the dish is common to most Bengaluru residents. In 2023, the citizens of the garden city ordered a whopping 29 million dosas — with an average of 122 dosa per minute just during breakfast hours! All these sky-touching numbers make one think — how did this delicious dish come into existence? Well, we did some research and came across some amazing theories. T ..read more

Amid the scorching heat of Indian summers, a juicy, tangy, and sweet saviour comes to the rescue: the mango. This tropical delight hangs from trees, their branches bending under the weight of the plump, sun-kissed fruit. Remember those childhood days when mangoes were the ultimate treat of summer? We’d rush to the market, clutching a few rupees, and carefully select the ripest, juiciest mangoes. Bringing them home was like carrying a piece of sunshine. We’d fill a large pot with cool water, gently submerging the mangoes, watching as they bobbed and danced. The wait felt endless. Finally, after ..read more

Reminiscent of a flat disc or plate, Karnataka’s thatte idli (a steamed rice and lentil cake) is larger than the usual variants of this cult favourite South Indian breakfast dish. The ‘cloud-like’ texture of these idlis is lent by the ground tapioca pearls that go into the batter. With a side of hand-churned butter and spicy coconut chutney, the thatte idli is the ultimate crowd-puller. In this article, we explore heritage restaurants and local spots that dish up this popular snack as well as famous idli joints in Bengaluru. 1. Veena Stores In a video put out by food and travel platform Curly ..read more

When your baby turns six months of age, it signifies a major milestone. It is the time for them to start solid foods, with most cultures having a ceremony to mark the occasion.  Celebrations aside, the weeks leading up to this milestone are filled with great confusion as parents read books, speak to family and friends, watch videos and consult doctors/nutritionists about what they should offer to the child first.  As a mother  to a 15-month-old, I wonder what to feed my toddler daily and  how to give him a balanced diet. Our anxiety increases when we see a variety of opinio ..read more

The morning of 30 May, 2022, is still a blur of memory for Delhi resident Samyak Jain. It was the day the UPSC exam results were set to be declared. As Samyak and his parents gathered around the computer screen, refreshing it multiple times eager to watch the score reflect, a million thoughts were racing through his mind. “Let my name feature in the list,” Samyak shares what he was praying for during those moments of waiting. An hour later, tears of joy and happiness were being shed as a shocked Samyak still grappled with the fact that he had scored an All India Rank (AIR) 7. Anticipating to f ..read more

A couple of years back while switching channels, Dheeraj Verma came across a television programme that showcased how Israel has pioneered hydroponic farming – an innovative and efficient way to grow crops without needing soil. This soil-less farming technique piqued the interest of the Barabanki district farmer. “Israel has been extremely progressive in farming despite having a dry climate, limited water resources, and high population density,” he tells The Better India. “With what they grew in an acre of land, they were able to export it to several countries. I wondered, if they were exportin ..read more