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Dipna, centre, flanked by proud Dad, Gulu (left)
and Uncle Kewal. |
A
Brilliant Result For Dipna
Congratulations
are in order for Hospitality student Dipna Anand,
whose family own the famous Brilliant Restaurant in Southall,
for achieving a 1:1 pass in her BA (Hons)
Hospitality management. |
During the
course of her studies, Dipna put her scientific knowledge to the test
by re-inventing Indian recipes with reduced fat and cholesterol to
tackle the high instances of coronary heart disease in the UK's
Indian population (including Hindhu Punjabis, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis).
Dipna began
her quest to produce healthier Indian food after her father suffered
a heart attack a few years ago. She has been experimenting using the
kitchens at her father's business, the Brilliant Restaurant in
Southall. She explains:
"Indian
cooking in the UK uses a lot of meat, butter and ghee. In some
recipes, I substitute meat with soya or use vegetables instead.
Certain breads are cooked on the griddle, and are normally coated in
ghee. Instead, I spray oil on the griddle surface, which really
reduces the calories and fat involved.
"Often
low fat Indian meals in supermarkets are tasteless and bland, but I
have experimented extensively with the right combinations of spices
to make my food taste like the real thing. Spices are important not
only for taste, but have health benefits too. For example, cumin is
known to have heart healing properties.
"There is
obviously a demand for food like this, as I have been approached by a
publisher to turn my recipes into a book."
This is no
flash in the pan - Dipna's ingenuity and knowledge about food has
long been acknowledged. She came top in the whole of the UK for her
A-level Food Technology project on low-fat Indian cooking, which was
awarded 100 percent. The project focussed on low-fat Indian cookery,
and she performed a nutritional analysis of her recipe inventions and
demonstrated how they could be produced on a large-scale.
Since this
triumph and during the course of her degree, Dipna has invented
almost 100 recipes. Her very proud family are putting her talents to
good use, having appointed Dipna Assistant Manager at the 250-seater
Brilliant Restaurant some time ago and the menu has been transformed
to include a large selevtion of her Healthier Eating options.
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