Indian Food Calories and Protein, Answered

A plain medium wheat roti without ghee is about 96 kcal. Add roughly half a teaspoon of ghee and the same roti becomes about 123 kcal. Four rotis a day with ghee add around 105 kcal from the ghee alone, which never shows on the plate. See the full breakdown for calories in roti.

About 143 kcal in a standard 150 ml katori of plain cooked rice. A larger bowl can easily be 180 to 200 kcal for the same rice, which is why your katori size matters. See calories in rice.

About 132 kcal in a katori of toor (arhar) dal with a normal tadka, plus about 6 g of protein. See calories in dal.

There is no single number for everyone. Your daily need depends on your weight, height, age and how active you are. A desk job and heavy physical work are very different numbers. The diet plan generator works out your own figure using the ICMR-NIN method.

ICMR-NIN sets a baseline of about 0.83 g per kg of body weight for an average adult. So a 60 kg person needs roughly 50 g a day, a 70 kg person roughly 58 g. If you train or lift regularly, treat that as a floor and aim higher. Work out yours on the protein calculator.

Anchor every meal and snack around a protein source. A sample day: 3 eggs (about 20 g) or sprouts with besan chilla (about 15 g) plus a glass of milk (7 g); a katori of dal (6 g) with curd (4 g) and 2 roti (6 g); a fistful of roasted chana or peanuts (7 g); and 100 g paneer or chicken (19 to 27 g) with 2 roti. Pure veg is harder, so lean on soya chunks, paneer, dal, curd and milk. Check your own combo on the calculator.

About 6.6 g of protein and 67 kcal in one boiled egg. See calories in a boiled egg.

About 18.9 g of protein in 100 g of paneer, at roughly 306 kcal. Most of those calories, around 220 kcal, come from fat, not protein. See calories in paneer.

By protein per normal portion: soya chunks (about 18 g per cooked katori), paneer (about 19 g per 100 g, but fat-heavy), dals and legumes like rajma and chole (6 to 7 g per katori), curd (4 g), milk (7 g per glass), and roasted chana or peanuts (6 to 7 g per 30 g) for snacks. Use soya and paneer as anchors. The protein calculator shows veg combinations.

About 6 g per katori of toor dal, roughly one-eighth of a 60 kg adult's daily protein. Dal is good but not enough alone, so pair it with curd, egg, paneer or soya.

Work out your maintenance calories first, the amount that keeps your weight steady, then eat a bit below that. A small steady gap is easier to hold than a crash. The diet plan generator sets this for you. This is general nutrition guidance, not medical advice.

No single food makes or breaks weight loss. A katori of rice is about 143 kcal. The issue is usually quantity, two or three katoris without noticing, not the rice itself. Measure your portion and it fits most plans.

Paneer gives about 19 g of protein per 100 g, which helps with fullness, but most of its calories are fat. It works in controlled amounts of 50 to 100 g, not a big bowl of malai paneer in rich gravy. The quantity and the oil are the real issue. See calories in paneer.

Two besan chillas with curd (12 to 15 g), three eggs with a roti (about 22 g), moong sprouts chaat with milk (about 15 g), or paneer bhurji from 100 g paneer with a roti (about 22 g). Plain poha or bread is mostly carbs, so build breakfast around eggs, paneer, besan, sprouts or dairy.

A standard katori is about 150 ml, but every home's bowl is different. A 200 ml katori holds a lot more, so the same dal can be 132 kcal in one bowl and nearly double in another. Fill your katori with water once and measure it. The calculator lets you set your real size.

Almost always two reasons: your katori is a different size from the one the chart assumed, and your cooking oil is different. Most charts ignore both. A calculator that lets you set your katori and oil gives numbers that match your actual plate.

Standard WHO cutoffs are too loose for South Asian bodies. Asian-Indian cutoffs put a healthy BMI at 18.5 to 22.9, with overweight starting at 23, not 25. Many Indians read as normal on a Western chart but are overweight by the cutoffs meant for them. BMI is a rough guide and does not tell muscle from fat. Check yours on the BMI calculator for Indians.

About 139 kcal in one thekua and about 190 kcal in a katori of rice kheer; a banana is about 105 kcal. These are worth tracking only for those who already track their daily food. See the full Chhath prasad calories page.

Not always. Kuttu, singhara and sabudana are deceptively high because they are usually fried, so the oil adds more than the ingredient. Break a long fast gently with fluids and fruit first. See vrat and Ramzan food calories.

Groteins uses official Indian sources: the Indian Food Composition Tables 2017 for food values, and ICMR-NIN Nutrient Requirements for Indians 2020 with the Dietary Guidelines for Indians 2024 for daily needs. Groteins uses this data; it is not the source itself.