What is the healthiest Indian food?

IndiaCharlie

Hi, first of all I'm new here and I'd just like to say that this site if a brilliant source of information. Anyway, I'm going to be working in Delhi for a few months this Summer and I've recently started eating healthy and cutting back the calories etc. I hear Indian food is extremely calorie dense, so I was just wondering what would be the "healthy" dishes to stick to. I know nothing about Indian food at the moment and would like to learn about what I'll be choosing off the menu when I'm over there. I understand a lot of the things will be in english, but I'm interested in how it's cooked and all. Are there any good common lentil/vegetarian dishes? Anyway cheers if anyone can help out!

Roaming Jack

My first advice would be to screw the healthy food routine, enjoy the "calorie dense" Indian food, but go easy on the portions.

As to the lentil dishes, of course there are lentil dishes of all kinds -- different kinds of dal. If you cook dal yourself -- in one of them banned-in-the-Western-world exploding pressure cookers (you know, which you approach with trepidation, if you don't know about these, you soon will) -- you can make it as healthy as you want. Recipes are all over the internet. If you eat outside, I doubt you're going to find low-cal dal or low-cal Indian food.

IndiaCharlie

Ha yeah screw it I guess, I'll just steer clear of sauces and stuff. Unfortunately the place where I'm staying doesn't have cooking facilities, but I might buy some cooking equipment while I'm there - this is probably a stupid question, but is sliced bread hard to come by? I wouldn't mind a sandwich maker!

irfan.in.tx

Breakfast: idlis with sambhar -- skip the accompanying chutney, which is usually made of sesame and/or coconut, high in saturated fats.

Lunch and dinner: tandoori chicken or chicken tikka
vegetables (ask for dry, without gravy)
plain dal -- not dal fry
white rice or chapathis (ask for 'sookha' or dry, without oil).

Desserts: avoid the ones with khoya, which is thickened milk, and very rich.

Avoid anything that says 'makhani' 'malai' 'fry'. Figure out the stuff that is deep fried and stay away.

puchoo

slice bread is readily available. 8-9 INR for a half pack.

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Aishah

You can buy sandwich makers in Delhi easily. Also you are in the perfect place for wonderful food in my opinion. Look up some of the restaurant threads in the Delhi forum and they will point the way for you. Most of the good ones mentioned, you can eat the salads (I do with no untoward effects). There is a great variety of veggies in Delhi - Khan Market, Defence Colony, spring to mind as having many good restaurants of different choices. Your local veggie market/fruit market can be a source of good non-calorific foods. You can prepare your own salads etc. without cooking. Wash the stuff in filtered or iodized water.

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crvlvr

Indian food is not that unhealthy,. if you stay away from the sweets and anything fried in Hydrogenated Oil -- which is used a lot by lower end food stalls.

navinkurian2002

cant comment on the "healthiest"
But a healthy drink is chaas

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brishti

concur totally with navin.
'chaas' is buttermilk - great for summer months, as is lassi
tender coconut water is another great summer coolant.

most advisable - plenty of liquid [in any form ] in the following summer months -

aishaaa - how you enjoying yourself? great to see you here again.


:brishti

Nick-H

Sliced bread is easily available, but you will have to do some searching for anything other than over-sweet white bread that seems to have been made from plastic.

Can be found though.

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nayan

1.the staple meal of chapatti, rice, plain dal, mixed veg, dahi(yogurt)is healthy and suited to the climate.
2. you will get sliced bread everywhere. you will also get brown bread/wholewheat bread in most supermarkets/big grocery shops
3. there are also plenty of restaurants serving chinese, italian, mexican, thai etc food.... so you can occasionally take a break from indian food.
4. Indian food itself is so varied.... alll the states have their own styles of cuisine..... very difficult to summerize..... go through some of the threads in the food and recipe forum

pantelis

chapati is the leathiest

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atala

Healthiest in terms of protein balance as well as digestability is kichuri, sometimes also written kitchdi, here a foto:
http://onehotstove.blogspot.com/2008...i-comfort.html
It is a mix of rice, dal and veg and the main spices, with a scoop of ghee really tasty. In Tamil Nadu Pongal has a certain similarity.

Ignite

Not so healthy after the scoop of ghee though is it?

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IndiaCharlie

wow you guys are a lot of help - Some really helpful suggestions here! - atala that's exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for, I'll make sure to put it on my list! I suppose what I'm trying to avoid is anything deep fried or really creamy. Good protein content is a massive plus! (hence my lentils question) - I read that tandoori chicken is also quite healthy, but I'm not particularly keen on eating meat while I'm over there, considering I'm on quite a tight budget and will be eating in fairly cheap places!