Check out what Indian Nutritionist Manisha Mehta had to share regarding nutrition, methods that she uses to help her patients, and a lot more.
As human beings, it is not always easy for us to follow and maintain a quality diet. With less activity and more junk food at our disposal, we tend to ignore our health. That is why we tend to reach out to a nutritionist to help us manage the food that we consume. Indian Nutritionist Manisha Mehta is helping people in their weight, fat & muscle management using an anti quick fix sustainable approach while also managing therapeutic concerns like diabetes mellitus, hyper & hypothyroidism, hypertension & PCOD by the application of the concepts of food sciences, processing, healthy cooking methods & nutritional calculations based on the WHO & National Institute of Nutrition standards.
She designed structured Meal Plans for the global mobile application โFatSecretโ for their launch to the Indian market. Inhibition of mold infestation by organic acids in various food groups. Quality testing of food products, artificial flavors, and savory. Retort packaging optimization for tomato ketchup. Detailed literature documentation on Modified & Controlled atmosphere packaging and its application. Food Safety Management Systems conducted by Quality Council of India, including the implementation of GMP and HACCP. We had a chat with Manisha about the common concerns that people have regarding nutrition.
My journey as a nutritionist actually started by accident, just like any other 12thย grader. I was also clueless about what I should do in college, and since I was a physics, chemistry, biology & mathematics student who scored well also just like any other family, my family also had that one uncle who tells everyone what stream they can choose for their education so he suggested me that I should study food technology because he said that he has a lot of contacts in the hospitality industry and I can become a food quality specialist in some hotel, and thatโs why I chose food technology from Shaheed Rajguru College of applied sciences Delhi university. (which definitely was the best decision I took. Once I was done with my graduation I did a post graduation in packaging technology so I studied about how plastics work, how food actually reacts with the packaging material, what kind of ink can be used and all of that industrial stuff and after that course was over I went to Unilever to work as an intern for the Knorr division but during my internship with the new found freedom, I gained a lot of weight, I also realised that the corporate culture is not going to work for me and I realised my craving to stay close to the studies of human Physiology, food and how food reacts with the human body so once I came back I wanted to study further in the area of my interest and thatโs when I started my masters in nutrition with the vision of becoming a teacher however once I started studying Clinical Nutrition I realised that the kind of diet plans that I was making were actually helping a lot of people get to their health goals and in the mean time I also started applying those concepts to myself and started seeing a lot of change in myself as well and thatโs how I became a nutritionist but one thing to note here is that before a nutritionist I am a foodie Punjabi and as everyone knows punjabis are known for eating and talking and in a way I made that my profession so now I talk about food and make fitness easy for foodies and one graduation, two post graduations, multiple national and international certifications, ย publications and helping 1000s of people with their health goals in over 9 years, now I have also started teaching young dieticians how to make their clients a fit foodie while having financial independence doing it.
As a nutritionist, what are the most common queries that you come across?
The most common questions that I come across are weight loss and now since the times are changing, people also talk about muscle gain which is a happy change and now since people are getting more aware of the benefits of workouts too I get a lot of queries about increasing sports performance also however I still see a lot of people coming across many medical issues including hypothyroidism, diabetes, PCOD as well.
What is your method of approach that has worked for you and your patients?
I deeply believe that food, exercise and recovery i.e. sleep can actually solve any issue that we face and when I talk about food my approach always is to analyse the kind of food that the person has grown up eating and make a plan which actually is In Sync with that old habit only because I believe as well as I have experienced whenever we do something which we havenโt done ever and we know that we cannot do for a long time the results of that always relapse.
What are basic diet precautions that people should take care of, before and after taking the COVID Vaccine?
Vaccines are nothing else but a small amount of the virus which is in question, in this case, Covid 19 that is being injected inside our body so that our natural immunity can recognise that and fight it off in the future.so while planning for the vaccination& ย after the vaccination it is very important to take care of our immune system. the first thing to be done for that is to eat properly avoid junk as much as we can have a good amount of fruits and fresh vegetables on an everyday basis and not be sleep deprived as I always keep saying our body can take on anything if we do not mess up.
What tips would you recommend to older adults for healthy immune system?
In old age, our body very rapidly deteriorates and that is why it's very important for the old people to take care of their system which is already going through a lot of damage the things which can be done for that is having food which is rich in calcium protein vitamin di and have a little bit of exercise every single day.
What would your ideal cheat day menu look like?
I believe that Indian people do not need cheat days at all the reason behind that is that even if we just follow our culture there are a lot of special days even on a monthly basis for example if we go back into our rituals every 15 days it's a normal day or amavasya on which itโs a ritual to make kheer at home which means we have access to a desert every 15 days and on top of that we have so many festivals which are all about festivities or food so rather than planning a cheat day my suggestion for everyone is to eat in a balanced form because if you are eating your roti rice Dal sabzi on an everyday basis you would be having carbs protein and fibre everyday then what will you even cheat on that way your body doesn't go into a shock if you eat a nasty meal and you get the freedom to enjoy celebrations with your family talking about myself as I said I am a big time foodie and that is why my everyday meals contain around 6 to 7 chapaties a bowl of rice vegetable milk and I like a lot of flavours in my food for which Indian spices come in handy and that is why I donโt even crave for cheat meals.
To know more about nutrition and Manisha's approach to it you can check out her Instagram page @dietitianmanisha
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