Is Roti Canai Healthy? (3 Tips For Weight Loss) 

If you enjoy Southeast Asian food, such as Roti Canai but aren’t sure if this dish is healthy and fits into your lifestyle, this article is for you. Find out what goes into making this popular Asian dish and see whether, or not you can lose weight and stay in shape, eating delicious Roti Canai.

Roti Canai is an Indian-influenced type of flatbread that is available in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore among other Southeast Asian countries. It consists of only a few simple ingredients and is consumed as a side with many main dishes, such as curries. 

Although Roti Canai is delicious, is it healthy or even good for your waistline? 

Roti Canai is not necessarily healthy, as it consists of a high amount of calories per piece, and sodium.  

Here are three steps that explain the calorie amount, the ingredients that go into making Roti Canai, and how to stay fit and healthy while eating this traditional Southeast Asian dish. 

1. What Goes Into Making Roti Canai? 

2. How Many Calories Are in One Piece of Roti Canai?

3. How to Lose Weight, or Maintain Weight, While Eating Roti Canai

Now that we know our three steps, let’s check out what goes into making Roti Canai, how many calories it contains, how to lose weight, and stay in shape while enjoying some delicious Roti Canai.

Tip 1. What Goes Into Making Roti Canai? 

Traditionally, Roti Canai is made with flour, ghee, and water. The dough is then being kneaded repeatedly, flattened, oiled, and folded before it’s set to rest - also known as “proofing”- which creates layers. The dough ball goes through another process of flattening it out until it’s paper-thin and then turned into a rope-like clump, which is then kneaded into a spiral or a knot, flattened again, and then cooked by pan-frying the dough in some butter or oil. 

Roti Canai is also versatile and can be customized to your likings, such as making it with eggs, onions, meat, or a sweet version for breakfast with condensed milk. 

Since it’s a staple in Southeast Asian cuisine, you can find it at many restaurants that are serving Thai, Indian, Indonesian, or Malaysian cuisine.

Now that we know what Roti Canai is, let’s take a look at the nutritional facts and see how many calories go inside one piece of Roti Canai.

Tip 2. How Many Calories Are in One Piece of Roti Canai?

The key aspect is to understand how many calories you need to consume in a day, whether you have a sedentary lifestyle or an active lifestyle, and to make sure not to overeat on your total calories for the day.  

Let’s take a look at the nutrition facts. As you can see, one piece of Roti Canai has 300 calories with a macronutrient ratio of 45 grams of carbs, 6 grams of protein, and 10 grams of fat.  

Not only is Roti Canai high in calories per one piece but it’s also high in sodium, at 570mg. Another fact is that it lacks protein and fat which is crucial for muscle gain. 

If you burn more calories than you consume, then you will find yourself in a “caloric deficit” which is the only way fat loss can occur. 

Staying healthy and fit is all about calorie or energy balance, which means that you can still eat your fats and carbs, and stay in shape. Although the calories are a bit high in this dish, they can be easily incorporated into your daily calorie intake, as long as you are not overeating and are working out. 

It’s important to first go over your daily caloric needs, and figure out how many calories you need in a day. The next step is to figure out how much of each macronutrient you should be consuming.

A good rule of thumb for dieting is keeping a nice balance of macronutrients. A great ratio is sticking to 30% carbs, 40% protein, and 30% fats. 

There are a few factors that determine your daily calorie intake. Such as weight management, weight loss, or weight gain. Other factors that play a big role, are your gender and your height. 

So, how do you know how many calories you should be eating in a day?

The answer is through trial and error and finding a calorie range that allows you to lose 1-2 pounds of fat per week. 

However, a good place to start is to multiply your body weight by 12 or to use an online TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure) calculator.

Your TDEE relies heavily on how active you are and how much movement you see in your day.

Within your TDEE lies a subsection, which is called TEPA (Thermic Effect of Physical Activity) which accounts for 15-30% of your entire day’s worth of calories. 

This means, you are in control of 15-30% of how much you can eat, which is a huge portion of calories.

Be mindful that these methods will give you rather rough estimates that are not specific for your body type per se but you’ll see that they can get pretty close. 

If you’re someone who loves to eat a lot while staying fit, then being active is the key to a balanced lifestyle that allows you to eat whatever you like, such as Roti Canai, and stay in shape. 

Once you know your calorie intake based on your weight and height, you can then decide how much you want to decrease it. If you want to lose 1 to 2 pounds per week, we suggest you start with 100 calories less than what you are currently consuming and see if you notice a difference within a week. 

It is suggested, however, to not decrease the calorie intake below 1,200 per day for women, or below 1,500 calories per day for men.

If you don’t see any changes in your weight, decrease your calorie intake by another 100 calories and see how that works. 

The key here is to find foods that keep you full longer and still deliver a balanced amount of macronutrients. 

You don’t want all of your calories simply coming from carbs or fats, you want there to be a balance coming from carbs, protein, and fats.

So, just calculate whatever calorie range you find, and split up your calories by following those macro guidelines. 

Now that we know how many calories are in one piece of Roti Canai and how many calories you should consume daily, let’s take a look at how you can, stay in shape, lose weight while eating Roti Canai.  

Tip 3. How to Lose Weight, or Maintain Weight, While Eating Roti Canai

You can easily over-eat unhealthy, processed foods that are high in fats and carbs, especially when something is as delicious as Roti Canai. Overeating is usually the quickest way to get out of shape.  

As we have mentioned in section two of this article, it’s important to understand how many calories you need to eat in order to lose weight and stay in shape.  

After you’ve figured out how many calories you need to consume daily, you need to make sure that you exercise regularly and build muscle throughout every week.  

Building muscle allows you to burn calories at rest, which means you can eat more and still lose fat. 

This is the daily goal of working out and is what keeps you healthy as your metabolism increase. 

So if you love eating Roti Canai the traditional way, you have to make sure your activity level is higher than usual, especially if you want to lose weight.  

Keep in mind that weight loss is the concept of calories in vs. calories out.

Although working out and building muscle takes priority, having a consistent cardio schedule can help with expediting the fat loss process as it raises the energy expended throughout your week.

There are two types of cardio that you can do in your week that will speed up the fat loss results. Those two types come from LISS (Low-Intensity Steady State) cardio and HIIT (High-Intensity Interval Training) cardio. 

What you want to aim for is to burning around 1,000 kcals of cardio every week through means of either LISS or HIIT.

LISS is cardio that comes from walking or a brisk walk, you should be able to have a conversation while still building up a sweat.

HIIT cardio is intervals of a very high-intensity movement, such as sprints, battle ropes, or kickboxing movements aiming to quickly raise the heart rate.

The benefit of HIIT is allowing yourself to burn calories in a shorter amount of time. 

Working out allows you to be more flexible in your diet and lifestyle, which is so important if you want to sustain a lean body and stay healthy while eating Roti Canai. 

THERE IT IS!

If you follow our three tips, it will definitely help you stay fit while eating some Roti Canai. 

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