A new food chain that serves 'diet fries' and 'healthy samosas' on the menu recently opened in the city, claiming to serve 'low calorie junk food'. Sunday MiD DAY took a nutritionist along to sniff out the real health-food joints and answer a simple question: Can we find a meal that's not just tasty but really nutritious too?

We belong to a culture that defines food as reward and aspires to eat out often and more. But we're also the sort to call someone who puts on weight, 'healthy', so we might need a crash course in perspective. "Most people assume that health food will be boring and bland.


Nutritionist Samreedhi Goel goes undercover at Khar's Fellas
Cafe and is served a Wheatgrass shot. Pic/Santosh Nagwekar

The idea is that, 'if I am going to eat out, I want to enjoy my meal'," says nutritionist Samreedhi Goel, who runs Size Wise, a personal training studio in Santacruz. As in life, healthy eating comes down to choice, says Goel.

"Start with the choice of restaurant you are going to eat out at," she says, explaining, "Dieting is about strategy. You need to plan your calories over the next three hours. If you know you're going to have a lazy day, then you need to consume fewer calories during the course of the day."

When looking to eat healthy at a restaurant, Goel suggests opening up a dialogue with the staff. "Talk to the waiter, ask about the options available and see if they can have a particular dish served steamed, instead of fried," she advises.

Other tips Samreedhi recommends are starting a meal with a clear soup or a salad (with the dressing served separately). "When you are at a buffet, pick up a small plate instead of a large one, and walk away from the buffet once you're done serving yourself," she adds. We took Goel along to four of Mumbai's healthy eateries.
Here's a detailed report card of how our experience went.

Fellas cafe
Claim: To be a health food cafe
What we ate: Grilled Chicken Sandwich with whole wheat multi-grain bread, Roasted Red Pepper, Tomato and Basil soup, Wheatgrass shot, Spinach-pineapple-apple juice

Opened earlier this year, Fellas is run by a bunch of "fellas", one of whom started juice parlour J-Kart. The cafe takes up most of the driveway of a building, with a tailor shop and a barber shop running parallel to it, and leads into what one presumes was once a garage, so the ambience isn't much to write home about. Its plastic chairs and tables are also less than comfortable.

In better news, the 10-page menu boasts lots of 'healthy' options with calorie counts listed alongside each. The calories for the Grilled Chicken sandwich (255 calories), Wheatgrass shot (20 calories) and Spinach-pineapple-apple juice (169 calories) seemed fair, according to Samreedhi, who had her doubts about the Roasted Red Pepper, Tomato and Basil soup being just 20 calories.

"It is difficult to believe that such a generous portion of soup would be only 20 calories, as one medium-sized tomato is in itself 20 calories," she said. "Based on my calculations, the soup has at least 90 calories (100 gm tomato (40 cals); Red bell pepper (50 to 30 cals); remaining ingredients (20 cals)), assuming that no oil/fat went into it!"

Goel says, "The Grilled Chicken Sandwich that we ordered had boneless, skinless chicken. The added flavours were light and enjoyable, but the sandwich became a little dry after it went cold. The multi-grain bread looked and tasted genuine, as it breaks easily, and the high-fibre was quite filling, so much so that I couldn't eat the whole thing.

The Wheatgrass shot felt like it contained a sweetener, and while they admit that they might occasionally use a little sugar or honey or pineapple or grape juice to sweeten the juices, to me, it felt like an artificial sweetener (aspartame) had been added, because of the metallic after taste on the tongue.
Goel adds, "I don't see the need to sweeten wheat grass juice since the person opting for it is likely to be someone, who is health-conscious and is not ordering it for its taste."

At: 14A, Ahimsa Marg, opposite Mahavir Hospital, Khar (W).
Call: 32267678 Open every day from 7 am to 11.30 pm



Billo's cafe
Claim: Bakes junk food without using a single drop of oil
What we ate: Diet Fries, Samosa, Chilli Garlic Potato pops

The tag line of Billo's cafe claims: Junk Food Is Now Guilt Free. The closer you near a counter of any of Billo's outlets, including those housed inside multiplexes in the city, the more fantastical the claims get. 'Up to 70% oil free', '0g trans fats, 0g cholesterol', 'Up to 80% fat free'.

Our curiosity is piqued, especially given their product range lists Diet Fries, Chilli Potato Pops and the legendary A1 samosas. Could it really be possible for us to indulge in these deep-fried favourites, without worrying about calories and cholestrol?

Here are some of the claims made by the eatery, and what our nutritionist had to say about them. No use of oil: "If it sounds too good to be true, it is! We did a small test by placing the food on a tissue paper. Within a few minutes the tissue had started to absorb oil from each of the products."

Up to 70% oil free: "If you are watching your weight or even just your fat intake, bear in mind that if this claim is true, the product still has 30% fat. To give you an example, if you eat a large boiled potato which weighs about 100 grammes, it will have approximately 95 calories and 0% fat. Based on their claim, these fries have 30 grammes fat per 100 grammes of fries. This exceeds the ideal daily fat intake, which is 20 to 25 grammes of fat in an entire day."

0g cholesterol: "Cholesterol is usually present in animal products like red meat, liver, egg yolk, cheese, shrimp and pork. Grains and vegetables have an insignificant amount of cholesterol. Cholesterol is produced by the human body in the liver.

A vegetarian product (potato) that is cooked in vegetable oil is bound not to have cholesterol. People who end up with high cholesterol are those who continue to consume high-fat foods over a sustained period of time."
Solution: "If Billo's wishes to catch the attention of dieters or people trying to get fit, they should advertise themselves saying, '70% less fat than other French fries' instead."