How to eat rice and lose weight
Rice is not a popular item on most dieting charts. Does its contemporary, the roti, score more on the dieting scale? I have heard a lot of people say that they have stopped rice and switched over to eating rotis in an attempt to reduce weight. I have myself suggested stopping eating rice to effect weight loss. Most people doing so claim that they have particularly reduced the tummy with a no rice diet.
For people from South India, not eating rice is a huge sacrifice since rice is their staple. So, let us see how one can eat rice and still lose weight.
The rice vs roti battle
· Rice is eaten not with just one side dish but an entourage of dishes and this is exactly why you can end up overeating. In the south, ghee is added to the first few morsels of rice. The next few mouthfuls need sambar, and rasam and the various poriyals or dry sabjis, and finally curds. Then, again how can one eat without pappad or pickle? Thus, calories add up to make the meal complete. On the contrary rotis can be eaten with one dal and a dry sabji or a dry sabji and raita. Simple but filling.
· Salad is not a popular accompaniment in the Indian rice combo. But rotis may go well with a raita or green salad.
· Rice is easily consumed since it does not require much chewing, while chewing roti needs a reasonable amount of time. Researches show that chewing well causes early satiety and slow eating leads to lesser eating.
· Estimating the quantity of rice to be eaten could go wrong unless one actually takes a measuring cup or weighing balance, while it is easier to count rotis by numbers.
· Unless you are eating brown rice daily, the fibre content may not be satisfactorily high, while it is possible to have whole grain atta and therefore higher fibre content is got from eating rotis.
· Whole wheat rotis have a lower glycemic index than rice. Possibly this explains why one feels less hungry eating rotis than rice.
How to eat rice and lose weight
· Most importantly, measure the quantities. An easy way to measure is by your fist. A fist full of rice is a good quantity of rice to eat. The idea is to have more accompaniments than rice on your plate.
· Forgo the pickle. Grill the papads instead of frying them.
· Mix rice with a dal curry, curds, sabji/poriyal and green salad. The raw vegetables in the salad, makes chewing a little slower and takes longer. The protein in the curds and dal gives a better glycemic index than eating rice with vegetables alone.
· Add a spoonful of bran or flaxseeds to the curds. This increases the fibre content.
· Drink a glass of water or a bowl of clear soup before starting the meal. This controls hunger.
Parvathy R Krishnan
The author is a trained Nutrition & Dietetics expert with over 20 years’ of experience in hospitals like Vijaya Hospital in Chennai and the Armed Forces Hospital and New Mowasat Hospitals in Kuwait. She is presently a member of the Research Society for the Study of Diabetes in India. Parvathy blogs at http://premadiet.blogspot.in/
More by this author:
How to reduce cholesterol in the Indian diet
Dieting tips for those at work
Tags: diet, nutrition, Parvathy Radhakrishnan, Rice, Roti, Salad, Sify Health, Weight loss
Loading ...
Inaccurate:-”For people from South India, not eating rice is a huge sacrifice since rice is their staple”.
Roce is a staple diet all over India except UP/Punjab/Haryana
Noted. Thanks, Dilu.
Even for a rice lover like me, it’s a ‘chewable’. Thank you Ms. Krishnan.
well written
Thank u for the script. I am a south indian, rice is a must in means, now-a-days reduced to one time, still overweight.
Polished rice is not good eat unpolished or handpolished rice (brown rice) .It is really tasty.
What wrong ideas. I am Keralite. We do not take ghee for first few morsals of rice. This happens only for big lunch after marriages etc. Otherwise, in our homes, we do not take ghee with rice. Our Kerala pickles are very less oily unlike Andhra pickles. Even curd is not taken regularly by Keralites, but we take buttermilk. The writer and the likes gets this wrong idea from hotel food. But please keep in mind hotel food – wherever in India – are far different from home foods of that locality.
i agreed with Manu.
I also agreed with the Manu .there is lot of difference in food made in home as compared to hotels.I am himachali but we also take rice in our daily life.
Does white rice reduce fat
An excellent review!
i love rice and will eat rice with sambar, thoran and fried pappad and fish fry and mango pickle. Yummmmmmmy
I DON’T WANNA LOSE WEIGHT!!! I LOVE MY FLABS
Madam;
Recently I received a mail from another nutritionist that pure cow’s ghee is good for body and full of good cholesterol. It went on saying that if taken regularly weight will be reduced, memory power will be increased, skin will glow.What is your comment?
If ghee is taken in small amounts (less than 10%) it does good to the body, provided you have healthy lifestyle otherwise. If taken in excess it will increase weight, just as any other fat does. Bottom line, use small amounts of pure unadulterated, ghee preferably made at home.
Secondly, if your ghee intake is from sweets made with ghee, then there is no benefit at all since the high sugar content negates any good effect of ghee.
Good advice!Ghee made at home is prepared by melting sour cream whereas commercial ghee is made by removing fat directly from milk. The smell and properties are different.