Most Indian food calorie charts give you a single confident number per dish. That is convenient and slightly dishonest, because home cooking does not have a standard serving and the cooking fat varies enormously between kitchens.
What follows is a chart with ranges, plus a note on what moves each number. Ranges are less satisfying and considerably more useful.
Breads
| Item | Serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Phulka, no ghee | 1 small | 60–75 |
| Roti, no ghee | 1 standard | 80–110 |
| Roti with ghee | 1 standard | 120–155 |
| Bhakri | 1 piece | 120–160 |
| Plain paratha | 1 piece | 150–250 |
| Aloo paratha with butter | 1 piece | 250–350 |
| Naan | 1 piece | 260–330 |
| Poori | 1 piece | 100–150 |
What moves it: thickness first, then added fat. See the longer piece on roti calories.
Rice and grains
| Item | Serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Plain rice, cooked | 1 cup / ~150 g | 180–210 |
| Jeera rice | 1 cup | 230–290 |
| Veg pulao | 1 cup | 250–320 |
| Veg biryani | 1 cup | 300–400 |
| Chicken biryani | 1 cup | 350–450 |
| Khichdi | 1 bowl | 250–350 |
| Poha | 1 plate | 250–330 |
| Upma | 1 plate | 250–350 |
What moves it: how much oil or ghee went in, and whether "one cup" means a katori or a proper cup.
Dals and legumes
| Item | Serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Dal (toor / moong), light tadka | 1 katori | 120–160 |
| Dal with generous ghee tadka | 1 katori | 180–240 |
| Rajma | 1 katori | 180–240 |
| Chole | 1 katori | 200–280 |
| Sambar | 1 katori | 100–150 |
| Dal makhani | 1 katori | 280–380 |
What moves it: the tadka, almost entirely. The lentils themselves are fairly consistent; the fat poured over them is not.
Vegetables and curries
| Item | Serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Dry sabzi (bhindi, lauki, cabbage) | 1 katori | 90–150 |
| Aloo sabzi | 1 katori | 150–220 |
| Mixed veg curry | 1 katori | 150–230 |
| Paneer butter masala | 1 katori | 300–420 |
| Palak paneer | 1 katori | 220–300 |
| Chicken curry | 1 katori | 220–320 |
| Egg curry | 1 katori | 200–280 |
What moves it: cream and butter in restaurant-style gravies. The same dish at home and in a restaurant can differ by 150 calories a serving.
Snacks
| Item | Serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Samosa | 1 | 200–280 |
| Vada pav | 1 | 280–350 |
| Dhokla | 2 pieces | 100–140 |
| Idli | 1 | 55–75 |
| Dosa, plain | 1 | 130–200 |
| Masala dosa | 1 | 250–400 |
| Pakora | 100 g | 300–400 |
| Marie biscuit | 1 | 25 |
| Parle-G biscuit | 1 | 22 |
| Parle-G Gold biscuit | 1 | 28 |
| Parle-G Royale biscuit | 1 | 50 |
Dairy and drinks
| Item | Serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| Chai with sugar | 1 cup | 70–110 |
| Chai without sugar | 1 cup | 40–60 |
| Black coffee | 1 cup | 2–5 |
| Curd, plain | 1 katori | 80–110 |
| Buttermilk | 1 glass | 40–70 |
| Lassi, sweet | 1 glass | 180–280 |
| Milk, full fat | 1 cup | 140–160 |
| Paneer | 100 g | 265–300 |
What moves it: sugar in chai, and how many cups a day. Four sweetened chais is 300–400 calories that most people never log.
How to use a chart like this
Do not treat it as authoritative for your kitchen. Use it to get within range, then correct against your own weight trend over two to three weeks.
Watch the fats. Across every section above, the difference between the low and high end is mostly oil, ghee, butter or cream. If you track one thing carefully, track that.
Beware the katori. Serving vessels vary a lot. If your dal katori is noticeably large, adjust upward and stay consistent.
Count the drinks. Chai, lassi and sweetened coffee are the most commonly missed calories in an Indian diet, precisely because they do not feel like eating.
Going deeper on one dish
This chart is a quick pass across a lot of food. If you want one dish properly — every serving size, the macros, and what specifically moves the number — the calorie count pages cover dal, rice, paneer, dosa, poha and about twenty more, one page each.
Or skip the chart
The reason charts like this exist is that food databases handle Indian cooking poorly, so people fall back on lookup tables and mental arithmetic.
BetterCal takes a different route: you write "dal, two rotis and a cup of chai" and it estimates each item against how that food is actually cooked and served where you live. Correct anything that looks wrong once, and the correction sticks for next time.
Which is, in the end, what a chart is trying to do — just without you having to be the one holding it.
Related: per-food calorie counts · how many calories in a roti · Indian food calorie tracker · easiest way to track calories
