Taken Away

HINESE food is more fattening than a McDonald's and fries, screamed an article in the national press recently. Tuck into a takeaway sweet and sour pork with batter and a portion of egg fried rice, and you'll be stacking away a staggering 60g of fat and 1,330 calories. Whoever said Chinese food was healthy?

Curry didn't fare much better at the hands of the tabloid scaremongers. A lamb passanda with pilau rice packed more calories than a Burger King Double Whopper with cheese, we were told - and even if you went for a supposedly-healthy vegetarian option, you could not guarantee a cholesterol-free meal. The average vegetable biryani contains 685 calories and 43g of fat, apparently.

For those who enjoy eating out (or eating in with a takeaway) and thought that by avoiding junk food they could do so healthily, this will have come as a nasty shock.

But before you panic and vow to give up Indian and Chinese food for good, listen up. As always, there is more to this story than some newspapers would have you believe.

Sure, some Indian and Chinese dishes are high in fat and cholesterol - but that doesn't mean they all are. Branding Indian and Chinese cuisine as unhealthy just because some dishes are high in fat is like saying European food is bad for you because a triple chocolate gateaux with clotted cream isn't recommended for those with high cholesterol.

The scare stories were based on a report in this month's Health Which? But far from seeking to dismiss Chinese and Indian dishes as unhealthy, the Which? report was a responsible study of a range of takeaway cuisines: looking at a selection of dishes from each and providing a nutritional breakdown as a guide to healthy eating. Its conclusions? If you love eating out or live on takeaways because you are too busy to cook, all you really need to know to avoid blowing a hole in your healthy eating plans is which dishes to go fo, and which to avoid or leave for a special treat.

It is a conclusion that Michael Lee, manager of Maxi's Chinese Restaurant in Nether Poppleton, agrees with. "The variety of Chinese cuisine is vast," he points out. "It all depends on what you eat."

If you insist on eating fried rice with everything, and dishes such as pork or, especially, duck, which are high in fat, you will be tucking into a fair few calories.

But there are plenty of healthy, low-fat options at any decent Chinese restaurant, too - dishes guaranteed to tingle the tastebuds without clogging up the arteries.

Michael says the healthiest meals to eat are those which are steamed. There are usually many to choose from. Dim sum are excellent as starters, says Michael - a range of small snacks, usually steamed, that the Chinese themselves often enjoy for breakfast. Then for the main course you could go for steamed fish - a Chinese speciality - and steamed vegetables. It's worth asking which vegetables are available; most restaurants will agree to steam virtually whichever vegetable dish a customer wants if they have them to hand.

For the really health conscious, there are a range of bean-curd dishes available - the steamed ones, obviously, are lower in fat and cholesterol than stir-fried.

Try one or two of the above options with plain boiled or steamed rice and you will be sure of a delicious meal that is high in nutrition and will not going to pile on the pounds or the cholesterol. Especially if you accompany it with a pot of Chinese tea - great for the digestion and known to lower cholesterol levels - rather than the usual pint of lager.

Even if you insist on stir-fried dishes, says Michael, by asking the waiter you can choose healthier options. Most restaurants these days fry in vegetable oil - and they will go light on that if you ask.

It's the same story with good Indian or Bengali restaurants. There are dishes that are high in fat and cholesterol - they tend to be the massala, passanda and korma meals, which use lots of cream, oil or clarified butter (ghee) - but there are plenty of healthier options.

If you're really worried about fat or cholesterol, the best dishes to go for are the tandoori meals, says Iqbal Chowdhury, general manager of York's two Bengal Brasserie restaurants, in Nether Poppleton and Goodramgate. They are traditionally cooked in a clay oven without added fat or sugar. Once again, going for plain boiled rice will reduce the calorie count.

Indian food also has an excellent selection of vegetable dishes, he says - great healthy eating options as long as they are not cooked in one of the creamy sauces such as Korma.

If you are worried about your weight or cholesterol levels, parathas are perhaps best avoided, advises Iqbal - but chapatis, made from plain flour, are very low in fat. And if you want naan bread - which, if you've got any sense, you will, because there is no finer food on the face of God's earth - you can always ask to have it prepared without butter, says Iqbal.

He says Indian food is hugely varied and there are plenty of great-tasting dishes which don't need lots of cream or butter.

Good Indian restaurants these days have made efforts to reduce cholesterol and fat levels in their dishes, in response to customer demand.

Ten years ago, he says, a lot of clarified butter was used to prepare dishes. Now, much more vegetable oil is the order of the day.

But, Iqbal advises, if you really want a low-fat, low cholesterol meal just ask.

Staff will be glad to oblige and recommend healthy eating dishes.

Oh, and instead of those two pints of lager, share a

bottle of wine instead.

Here, with thanks to Health Which?, are a few of the healthier and less healthy eating options...

Chinese

Healthy

Chicken chop suey with boiled rice (700 calories, 19g fat)

Szechwan prawns with vegetables and boiled rice (620 calories, 15g fat)

Fatty

Battered sweet and sour pork with egg fried rice (1,330 calories, 60g fat)

Chicken and cashew nuts with egg fried rice (1,020 calories, 36g fat)

INDIAN/BENGALI

Healthy

Chicken dopiaza with boiled rice (700 calories, 28g fat)

Prawn madras with boiled rice (550 calories, 25g fat)

Fatty

Lamb passanda with pilau rice (990 calories, 56g fat)

Chicken tikka massala with pilau rice (860 calories, 47g fat)