The food blogger – living in the present

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    Spotlight Audio 13/2021
    Natasha Diddee
    © Neville Sukhia
    Von Aparna Pednekar

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    Inez: In A Day in My Life, we meet Indian food blogger Natasha Diddee. The 47-year-old chef runs two popular Instagram accounts, The Gutless Foodie and The Gutless Foodie Eats Out. Diddee, who lives in the city of Pune in the west of the country, has a very particular reason for blogging about food.

    I’m a professionally trained chef, but eight years ago I lost my stomach to two bleeding ulcerGeschwürulcers and a tumour, and I had to basically relearn how to eat and how to survive. And it made me research a lot, and I realized that if I share this information with people, it might be able to help other people who have other disabilityEinschränkung, Behinderungdisabilities to to nurture oneselfsich pflegen, für sich sorgennurture themselves through food. So that’s why I started this, and I still continue it.

     

    Inez: Diddee hopes her Instagram feedhier: Seitefeeds get people more interested in home-cooking. 

    The food that is on my feed, the reason that I post that is, I want people to realize that food cooked at home doesn’t have to be boring. You can cook a variety of cuisines, different food, different non-vegetarian, and vegetarian, depends on whichever way you like to go. But whatever works for you and your family. And that’s what I’ve done.

     

    Inez: The food blogger would also like to change people’s ideas of what Indian cuisine is about.

    You know, worldwide, there is a misconceptionMissverständnis, Irrtummisconception that Indian food is about Butter Chicken and Chicken Tikka Masala and, you know, things like that. But you have to understand that even if you take a hundred rebirthWiedergeburtrebirths – I don’t even know if rebirths are possible, but I’m just speaking like that – even if you take a hundred rebirths, you will never ever be able to to encapsulate sth.etw. beschreibenencapsulate what Indian cuisine is, because it is so diversevielfältigdiverse. It depends on which region of India you are, whether you’re in the South, the North, the East or the West…and even there, you know, the same dish will differ from home to home. And the variety is just, it’s just mammothMammut; hier: riesig, megamammoth. So I think it’s because of that – I’m not saying it because I’m a very, very proud Indian – but I’m saying it because in the name of food, I don’t think there is any cuisine anywhere on the planet that can to boast of sth.(stolz) etw. vorweisen könnenboast of this kind of variety of food.

     

    Inez: So what have been the most important experiences for Diddee on social media?

    You know, I would have thought it would be people who praise my food, or who have been inspired by my food. Funnily, it’s not those people. It’s been about that young girl sitting in some remoteentlegenremote village somewhere, who’s going through something in her life which she never thinks she can get out of. And she suddenly to come across sth.etw. zufällig entdeckencomes across my feed, or she started following me recently, or has been a silent follower for a very long time. But something that I’ve written on my feed has to touch a chordeinen Nerv treffentouched a chord with her. Or even with young boys. With teenagers, people who don’t know where they should take their life, what direction they should take. They write to me, and I write back. And I’m not being an agony aunt (ifml.)Kummerkastentanteagony aunt. I don’t give any unsolicitedungefragtunsolicited advice. But I listen. And I think that the fact that somebody even listens to them, helps them. And that I think has been the most rewardinglohnend, bereicherndrewarding part of Instagram.

     

    Inez: How has Diddee’s medical conditionErkrankungmedical condition changed her relationship with food?

    I think it’s strengthened it. Because, before I didn’t have a stomach, I was like every average person. You know, the minute you put something in your mouth, you don’t think, “OK, now I’ve tasted it, now it’s going down my gullet, now it’s reached my stomach, now the acids are churning, breaking it down.” It’s gone and you’re onto your next bite. Whereas in my case, I have to think, should I eat those two French fries that I’m dying to eat or should I eat that piece of chicken which will stay in my… because animal protein stays longer in your system, which then gives nutrients to my body. So I have to choose, I have to decide. Because of that I have gone from living a mindless life to a more mindful life. When it comes to food or even other decisions, I’ve become more mindful as a person, simply because that’s my life circumstance now.

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