The title itself must have grabbed your attention. After all, who doesn’t love eating pakoda, chips, fries or samosa?
But these delicious dishes are packed with fat, the most-calorie dense nutrient. So, what’s the solution? Learn to eat it the right way.
Frying has always been an integral part of Indian cooking. And not to forget, it can be healthy too.
The whole fad of non –fried samosa is actually bad as it increases the glycemic index of the food as compared to the fried version. You could easily gobble down 2-3 baked samosas thinking the baked versions are good for your health. However, in reality, one fried samosa is far better than 2-3 baked ones.
Yeah, that’s the bitter truth.
But worry not! Help is at hand. Without much ado, let’s learn the smart way to eat fried.
Pairing and timing:
These two concepts of our PPTF approach should become your best friends if you want to relish fatty foods without worrying about the weighing scale. Once you learn to implement these two concepts, you’ll be able to make every day a cheat day!
Instead of the evening, savour your fatty food early in the morning, when you’re more active and your BMR is at its peak. As a result, fewer calories will get converted into fat.
Let’s say, you are in the mood for a samosa. Our advice is to skip the pav and instead get a protein-rich egg-white omelette or a besan chilla for breakfast along with the samosa. This way, you’ll get all your three pillars of nutrition – proteins, fats, and carbohydrates – in one meal. And btw, restrict yourself to one samosa.
Similarly, you can eat fries made from a medium-sized potato along with grilled paneer and veggies or grilled chicken for lunch or breakfast.
If you are craving for everyone’s favourite street food – pani puri, go ahead and treat yourself. Just remember, skip the potato and opt for sprouts, chana or ragda filling to balance the nutrients.
Choosing the right oil and cooking style:
Choose the right oil and frying method and the battle is half-won. Groundnut oil is your best bet. With its high smoking point and goodness of mono-unsaturated fatty acids, it is the ideal oil for frying.
Cooking fried at home is a trick that always works. You can monitor the quality and quantity of oil. Since frying is a tedious process, this way you’ll only use the frying pan once or twice a month. And yeah, deep frying at a high flame is much better than deep frying at a slow flame since lesser oil will be absorbed.
PS: Shallow frying may seem a healthier alternative, but sometimes, it absorbs more oil than deep frying. So, keep an eye on the oil you use while you shallow fry.
Some frying secrets:
Now, we are sharing some super tricks that will allow you to eat fried foods without any guilt attached:
Control the moisture
If the moisture of a particular food is high, the fat absorption goes double or even triple. So, keep the moisture content in check to ensure that fried foods do not absorb excess oil.
Let’s say you are preparing batata wada at home. The besan batter has to be of pouring consistency. If you add a lot of water, then the wada will absorb more oil and in turn, make it greasier and fatty. The same rule applies for pakodas.
The ‘magic’ ingredient
A soya-fortified batter is an excellent way to increase the protein content and lower oil absorption. Adding 10% soy flour with wheat flour or 20% soy flour to gram flour batter reduces oil absorption by nearly 20%. Now, that is a smart trick to ‘have your pakoda and eat it too’.
Avoid using fried oil repeatedly for frying
When we reuse oils, its smoking point decreases. This, in turn, leads to higher fat absorption.
Simple steps such as avoiding sodium bicarbonate in the batter or removing your favourite munchie on an absorbent paper will keep the fat in fried foods in check.
And if you are looking to get some smart recommendations on making nutritionally balanced meal plans then head right to bon happetee app and try the “build my meal” feature in meal suggestions section. Just tell us what you feel like eating and let the app build a complete meal around it. Say no to diet plans, say yes to smart meal plans and lose weight naturally.
Happy eating fried foods from team bon happetee 🙂
Vishruta is a nutritionist by profession and a writer by heart. Content writing and menu planning have become her passions over the past few years. Love food, love life — is her mantra.