
"Indian food is assumed to be strongly vegetarian, but it is actually lacking in vegetables. Our diet is centred around wheat, in the north, and rice, in the south. The second most important element is daal in its various forms. By weight, vegetables are not consumed much. You could have an entire South Indian vegetarian meal without encountering a vegetable. The most important vegetable is the starchy aloo. Greens are not cooked flash-fried in the healthy manner of the Chinese, but boiled or fried till much of the nutrient value is killed.
Read the whole essay "Why Indians are stressed and unhealthy" here. While I don't agree with everything Mr. Patel writes (for example, he's right that there aren't enough vegetables and that rice and wheat products that are often fried are to be blamed, but I don't agree with his blaming of ghee), I do agree with a lot (EXAMPLES) and with his overall claim that traditional diets are healthier than our modern one.