Ideas for 150-400 calories per serving Desi Food

[Bint_e_Naeem]

Re: Ideas for 150-400 calories per serving Desi Food

@bebo

What method you use for calorie counting. A pasta dish should not be that high in calories unless of course it has alferado or other cream based sause.

Bebo I am using sparkpeople, food.com & online search to count my calories. Thanks for the suggestion of seekh kababs.

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Sara **I used to guestimate a lot in the past & lets just say I was underestmiating everything. Since I have actually started counting every single calorie I swear it adds up to a lot.

@ehl-e-chamman

Food Nutritional Database | CalorieKing

a searchable database of foods and their calories … allows you to choose portion size.

Thank you much for the suggestion.

@nadeemnirvana

all desi food can be 400 calories or less if none/tiny amount of oil is used. the calories come from oil. additional calories are from the flour in roti or rice.

I have made desi food with no oil in a none stick pan. of course it does not taste the same but if your on a diet it still tastes good.

increase the amount of vegetables you add. that will reduce the calories.

Even a roma tomato has 25 calories. Heck even garlic powder has 2 calories. As I mentioned above if we really start counting every thing eventually adds up. I already make my salans with less oil. They don’t have any “shakal” but as long as its a little healthier I am all for it.

@njgal

Desi meals under 400 calories

bowl of daal (or any lentils) + 1 whole wheat roti

chicken boti / chicken tikka with 1/4 cup yogurt/raita

any subzi cooked in less oil (sauteed) + whole wheat roti

dahi pholki minus the frined pholki - add chana, aloo, onions, tomatoes, all the vegetables you can think of

Thank you much njgal. I am excited to try the last option.

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CB** Can you tell how you were able to count the calories on the desi food you were giving him? So far the only way I know is to manually enter each recipe & find out the nutritional values.

Also you mentioned 1 teaspoon oil a day. How were you able to bhoonify or fry your onions or salan in 1 teaspoon oil. Any tips would be really appreciated. I use minimum 1/4 cup or 4 tablespoons of olive oil for 8 servings. Heck I use 1 teaspoon oil just for plain boiled rice. (put it in the bottom of the pan before giving them dum so they don’t stick in the pan)

And the 200 calories desi desserts? I would love to know about those as well. I have tamed my sweet tooth but I am sure hubby jee would appreciate the extra effort.

I’ll also try the flax seeds that you mentioned. I rarely make roti at home. Have electric stoves. It doesn’t turn out right. Can I add the flax seeds in anything else? My morning cereal perhaps?

@redvelvet

I’m not crazy about chawal…I prefer roti. And I try to eat roti only once a day. So, if I have roti with salan during lunch…I have a green smoothie for dinner, which is also filling and contains plenty of nutrients. Or vice versa.

What’s a green smoothie?

Dosa Chick that’s awesome that your husband was able to lose that many sizes. We incorporate a lot of healthy things in our meals & snacks whenever we can. We including our 18 months old daughter eat double fiber bread & whole wheat buns & other breads. Wherever there is a lighter version available for things we substitute the fatty or more calorie ones with the lighter ones. Since I am counting my calories I have figured I need to do more than that.