How Many Calories In A Curry?
Every so often, I am asked how many calories are in a curry? Some people really enjoy eating a good curry but think that they are full of calories that will break a diet and they will make them gain weight.
Unfortunately, the answer isn’t just a matter of looking up numbers in a book. There are lots and lots of different curries and, if you’re not following a recipe, the calories in a curry can change from meal to meal.
Some curries have lots of calories. And it is sometimes impossible to know how many calories are in a curry, particularly with curries made in restaurant (either dine in or take out).
Curries that you make yourself are have fewer calories and frozen curries that you buy from a supermarket often have fewer calories than restaurant made curries.
Recently I wrote an article, titled “Curry Calorie Count”, that describes how difficult it is to find out the calories in a curry made in a restaurant and how those delicious side dishes can rack up the calorie count.
The article describes how I calculated the number of calories, kilocalories or kilojoules there are in three of the delicious curries made from the range of Curry Focus recipes.
The main problem with counting the energy content of curries is in knowing how many kilocalories, or kilojoules, are in the ingredients, particularly the spices.
To help you, the following table shows the kilocalories and kilojoules in the most common curry ingredients.
Note that all measures (teaspoon, tablespoon and cup) are for level measures.
| Ingredient | Measure | Kilocalories* | Kilojoules* |
| Bay leaves | 1 | 23 | 97 |
| Black peppercorns | 1 teaspoon | 0 | 0 |
| Canola oil | 1 tablespoon | 122 | 511 |
| Cardamom pods | 7 | 5 | 21 |
| Cardamom, ground | 1 teaspoon | 5 | 21 |
| Cayenne pepper | 1 teaspoon | 6 | 26 |
| Chicken breast, skinless and boneless | 3.5 oz (100g) | 163 | 682 |
| Chickpea flour | 1 cup | 484 | 2,026 |
| Chilli powder | 1 teaspoon | 8 | 34 |
| Chilli, fresh | 1 | 4 | 17 |
| Cilantro, fresh | 1 cup | 4 | 17 |
| Cilantro, fresh | 1 tablespoon | 2 | 9 |
| Cilantro, ground | 1 teaspoon | 5 | 21 |
| Cinnamon stick | 3 inch stick | 3 | 13 |
| Cinnamon, ground | 1 teaspoon | 6 | 26 |
| Cloves | 12 cloves | 7 | 30 |
| Cloves, ground | 1 teaspoon | 7 | 30 |
| Cumin, ground | 1 teaspoon | 8 | 34 |
| Garam masala | 1 teaspoon | 6 | 26 |
| Garlic paste | 1 teaspoon | 5 | 21 |
| Garlic, crushed | 1 clove | 4 | 17 |
| Ginger paste | 1 teaspoon | 1 | 5 |
| Ginger root, fresh | 1 inch | 5 | 21 |
| Lamb, lean and boneless | 3.5 oz (100g) | 145 | 607 |
| Lime juice | 1 tablespoon | 6 | 26 |
| Onion | 1 large | 40 | 168 |
| Onion | 1 medium | 30 | 126 |
| Onion | 1 small | 20 | 84 |
| Rice, Basmati | 1 cup | 170 | 711 |
| Rice, long grain | 1 cup | 205 | 858 |
| Salt | 1 teaspoon | 0 | 0 |
| Tomato | 1 medium | 26 | 109 |
| Water | Any | 0 | 0 |
| Yoghurt, plain unsweetened | 1 tablespoon | 10 | 42 |
* there are 4.184 kilojoules in a kilocalorie.
You need to be careful about using the numbers in the table. Some numbers are guesses, based upon what I could find on the Internet. And some are approximations (for example, there are a lot of different types of chilli and they can’t all have the same calories).
The biggest problem in working out how many calories are in a curry is all the math that you need to do. I find it a very boring and time-consuming process.
Hopefully this table will let you work out the kilocalories, or kilojoules, in your favorite curry.
