I wanted to write about ghee.

Not about all the supposed claims for why it is an Ayurvedic superfood.

I want to make one simple argument.

A diya.

How do you think we lit rooms before the advent of the lightbulb?

Around the mid 1800s, we were able to refine petroleum into kerosene.

For a while, we had to hunt whales. Renewable sure, but it takes a while.

Candles got popular in medieval Europe.

Before that hearth was the primary source of light inside buildings.

There’s a reason the Hellenistic cultures placed Hestia so highly.

A simple cotton wick dipped in ghee inside a small clay bowl.

Not the kind of technology we could call revolutionary by any means.

But robust enough to still survive to this day in desi households.

Somehow all these generations later, we are still using it to lather our rotis and spread light in the home.