The Director of Puducherry Institute of Linguistic and Culture, Mrs. Bhakthavatsala Bharathi, claims that Tamil cuisine is healthy and provides a lot of nutrients. In Tamilnadu, there exist about 209 castes and each of them have their own subculture and food traditions. Gingery Oil (Nalla Yenai) which is used regularly in the state to cook food, got its name because ‘Nalla’ means good and has also been mentioned in the Vedas. In Kerala, coconut oil is preferred over mustard oil as compared to the North, she added. According to her, olive oil is just a marketing gimmick which is gaining attention nowadays.
