Asian Restaurant Food

Even by itself Indian cuisine offers an enormous range of foods. When you add in the other cultural foods from the region, such as those from Bangladesh and Pakistan, we come to an enormous selection which we cannot hope to cover comprehensively.

This geographical region is easily comparable in size to Western Europe and with a greater population. We should not be surprised to find that their culinary styles vary as much as foods from England to Spain and from Italy to Germany.

So, for now, we will consider just some of the most popular Westernised variants from the subcontinent. See our Top Asian meal below.

Which meals are usually the healthiest?

Let’s start with the bad news. Ghee is the traditional cooking fat used in much Asian cuisine. It is usually derived from palm oil (although vegetable oil or butter variants are available too).
Foods which are very spicy tend to speed up your metabolic rate for a few hours

Like most cooking oils, ghee packs 900 calories per100g and it is all fat. Unlike most cooking oils ghee from palm oil is 100% saturated fat and is therefore potentially much more damaging to your health.

Better news is that the herbs and spices used in Asian food provide many of minerals we need to maintain good health and combat diseases.

Two poppadoms per person will start you off with around 70 calories and 4 grams of fat. Choose the raw onion and/or mint yoghurt dips. The mango chutney will have a lot of sugar, and may have a lot of salt too.

For a main meal select a dry dish as those with thick sauces tend to carry a much heavier calorie load. Lamb or chicken tikka (not tikka masala) are served on skewers along with chunks of onion and green pepper. Dopiaza with its onion ringlets is another good option.
You may want to order a yoghurt side dish with these; options vary from cubes of cucumber in a mint sauce to chopped lettuce, onion and tomato in plain yoghurt. The names of these dishes seems to vary widely too so it’s best just to ask.

Bhuna dishes should be cooked by adding the meat to a selection of spices which have been heating in a frying pan to release their flavours. In practice a thick tomato base or yoghurt is added to give them a sauce. If your restaurant does this then Bhuna is a also good choice.

Foods which are very spicy tend to speed up your metabolic rate for a few hours. While hardly a long term weight control or healthy eating strategy this could help justify ordering a Jalfrezi or even, for the less cautious or less sensible, a vindaloo made in the very hot British style (as opposed to the original Goan style which is spiced for flavour rather than heat).

Which meals are best avoided?

Onion and vegetable bhajis do contain healthy core ingredients but they have been deep fried and shouldn’t form part of a healthy meal.

As we’ve said above avoid anything cooked in or containing significant quantities of ghee. This generally means the “wet” dishes, served in thick sauces. In addition Kormas tend to have a large amount of crushed nuts, butter and cream included.

Chicken tikka masala has become a very popular choice, with some commentators even saying it should be the English national dish. It’s a mild curry dish of chicken in a sauce which usually includes tomato and either cream or coconut cream and various spices. Unfortunately that means it weighs in at well over 500 calories per serving, maybe a lot more depending on the restaurant, before you’ve added your rice or naan.
A single plain naan bread has around 400 calories and 12g of fat

Rogan Josh refers to food cooked in clarified butter at high temperatures. This is then flavoured with a variety of spices, red peppers and tomatoes, and mixed with yoghurt for a rich, smooth sauce. The clarified butter can’t be good for you so check how oily the dish feels; don’t choose it again if it has a lot of residual oils from the cooking.

People generally don’t go to an Asian restaurant and look forward to the dessert. So don’t force yourself; you’ll have consumed more than enough anyway by the time you’ve finished off your main course.

What about the side dishes?

Rice is offered in many varieties; plain boiled, pilau, mushroom, special, etc. few restaurants offer brown rice so choose plain boiled basmati rice.

A single plain naan bread of typical restaurant proportions has around 400 calories and 12g of fat. And that will increase further if you opt for garlic, peshwari or keema varieties. If you must have one then choose plain and share it with someone else.

Chapatis will not help you cut back either. Expect around 130 calories each and 8g of fat.

Vegetables dishes such as dhal (lentils) or tarka dhal (with garlic and ginger) often contain a lot of fat in the form of oils. A better choice is saag aloo (spinach and potato) or restaurant favourite Bombay potato.

The beers which most commonly accompany an Asian meal are Cobra and Kingfisher. Both are strongish lagers, and both are now brewed in the UK rather than being imported. Expect around 150 calories per half pint.

What is the per100g.com top Indian meal?

Tender tandoori lamb makes a delicious starter served with a spoonful of shredded lettuce and a lemon segment.

The main course has to be Chicken Tikka and plain boiled rice. A side serving of mint sauce does bring extra fat but still makes a welcome accompaniment.

Estimated nutritional information based on typical serving sizes of similar products:

	Total	Starter	Main	Sides	Drinks
Energy (kcal)	1080	179	250	351	300
Protein (g)	60.5	25.6	48.6	5.9	0.4
Carbohydrates (g)	61.0	7.0	1.4	49.6	3.0
incl. sugars (g)	21.6	4.6	0.8	13.2	3.0
Fat (g)	21.6	5.1	5.6	10.9	0.0
incl. saturated (g)	8.4	1.1	2.0	5.3	0.0
Fibre (g)	2.3	0.9	0.4	1.0	0.0
Salt (g)	4.1	1.2	1.2	1.7	0.0

You can see that a meal like this takes up a huge amount of a daily allowance for calories, saturated fat and salt. You’ll also have to make up for the lack of fibre. But every once in a while it make for a very tasty meal out.