10 High-Protein Indian Meals for Steadier Sugar

Most Indian diets are heavy on carbohydrate and light on protein, and a meal that is almost entirely carbohydrate has nothing in it to slow the rise that follows.

ICMR-NIN puts the protein requirement for an Indian adult at 0.8 g per kilogram of body weight a day — roughly 48 g for someone weighing 60 kg. It also notes that people eating mainly cereal-based diets need more than that, because protein from grains is of lower quality than protein from pulses, dairy, eggs or fish. India's dietary guidelines suggest 85 g of pulses a day (uncooked weight), of which about 30 g can be replaced by fish, meat or eggs.

Pulses are worth knowing about for a second reason. In the same Indian study that measured the glycaemic index of everyday foods, the two lowest results of twelve were both pulse dishes: white chickpea sundal at 24.1 and white peas sundal at 29.8.

Ten combinations that work

• Chana sundal — boiled chickpeas tempered with curry leaves and coconut
• Rajma with a small portion of rice, not the other way round
• Curd rice made with extra curd and less rice
• Paneer bhurji with one roti
• Egg curry with a vegetable sabzi
• Sprouted moong salad with onion, tomato and lemon
• Dal khichdi built with more dal than the usual ratio
• Sambar with real dal in it, over idli rather than beside it
• Soya chunk curry with beans or cabbage
• Fish or chicken curry with two katoris of sabzi

None of these are special-occasion foods. The change is one of proportion — making the protein the thing the meal is built around, with rice or roti in a supporting role.