Kitchen Chemistry

There is a saying in the traditional Indian system of medicines especially in Siddha medicine which is prominent in South India - ?Unave Marunthu? which means ?food itself is medicine?. This sentence will go hand-in-hand with the famous Hippocrates slogan ?Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food? as we all know that Hippocrates is the father of modern medicine and his words got tremendous attention even among laymen. But if we look into the history ?Unave Marunthu? was there even before 300 years of the birth of Hippocrates.