A comprehensive guide to our body, our food, and what we must do--and guard against--to keep ourselves and our children healthy and energized.

- Why have we Indians become so suddenly, and so quickly, obese?

- Why are our children overweight? Will they be diabetic and hypertensive before they are thirty?

- What is making us overweight? Is it our 'homefood' or 'outsidefood'?

- What happens to food once we eat it, and how is it linked to obesity?

- And if we are obese, what can we do about it?

In Fat, doctors Ishrat Syed and Kalpana Swaminathan meld the newest research with their own clinical experience to answer these questions and uncover the links between food and our bodies. We discover the magical relationship between the brain and the fat cell; how it enhances our enjoyment of a delicious meal, how it tricks us into choosing the right foods in the right amounts, and how this perfect balance can go haywire. We learn of the ways in which the stresses of our modern lifestyles--especially in urban India--are pushing us into becoming overweight, and what we can do about it. We learn, also, the essential principles of the perfectly balanced meal and how easy it is to implement them in our kitchens.