Rasam calories
A 200 ml katori of tomato rasam has about 50 calories, and a 150 ml tumbler to drink about 40. Rasam rice, with a 200 ml katori of rice, is about 210. The tadka is nearly all of it: a teaspoon of ghee or oil adds about 40 to 45. Restaurant rasam runs about 50 to 95.
Rasam is a thin, peppery soup of tamarind and tomato, with a little cooked toor dal and a spice powder of coriander, cumin, pepper and dry red chilli, tempered with mustard, garlic and curry leaves. It's served with rice in Tamil, Andhra and Karnataka meals, and drunk on its own from a tumbler.
It's one of the lightest things in a south Indian meal. Most of the calories in a katori come from the tadka oil and the small amount of dal.
Typical values for a home kitchen, for the portion named next to each number. Other sites often show bigger numbers because they count a bigger serving or a restaurant recipe. Your own katori, roti and oil change the number; Slate adjusts for them.
How many calories are in rasam?
| Portion | Cals | Protein | Carbs | Fat |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 katori (150 ml) about 150 g | 40 | 2 g | 5 g | 1 g |
| 1 katori (200 ml) about 200 g | 50 | 2 g | 6 g | 2 g |
| 1 katori (250 ml) about 250 g | 65 | 3 g | 8 g | 2 g |
| 1 tumbler (150 ml), to drink about 150 g | 40 | 2 g | 5 g | 1 g |
| 1 textbook bowl (about 385 ml) about 383 g | 95 | 4 g | 12 g | 3 g |
| 200 ml rasam with a 200 ml katori of rice | 210 | 6 g | 42 g | 2 g |
How does home rasam compare with outside?
Rasam in a meals hotel or restaurant is much like home rasam. Some places temper it with ghee, and it's usually refilled freely.
With no lab figure to go on, the range below adds up to a teaspoon of ghee to the tadka for each katori.
| Version | Cals | Fat |
|---|---|---|
| Home | 50 | 2 g |
| Restaurant or meals hotel | 50 to 95 | 2 to 7 g |
What changes the calories in rasam?
- The tadka is most of a katori's calories. A teaspoon of ghee or oil adds about 40 to 45.
- Dal rasam with more toor dal has more: each extra 10 g of dal adds about 35 calories to the pot.
- Lemon rasam and pepper rasam are close to tomato rasam per katori.
- Rice with rasam usually counts for far more than the rasam itself.
How were these numbers worked out?
The rasam is the tamarind rasam in Basic Food Preparation (via the Indian Nutrient Databank): 10 g of toor dal, 50 g of tomato, tamarind, dry and green chilli, ginger, coriander seed and pepper, in 1.25 cups of water with half a teaspoon of oil, counted as eaten, at IFCT 2017 values. The ingredients added together weigh about 383 g for the bowl, so the pot is 25 calories per 100 g and a 200 ml katori at 1 g per ml, like water, is 50. The rasam rice row adds a 200 ml katori of rice from the plain rice page, about 45 g of raw rice. No analysed rasam exists in IFCT 2017, NIN or USDA FNDDS, and the databank's figure comes from this same recipe, so there is no cross-check. No restaurant rasam has been analysed either; the outside range adds up to a teaspoon of ghee or oil in the tadka. Every dish on Slate is worked out the same way: how Slate counts calories.
| Ingredient | Raw | Values from |
|---|---|---|
| Red gram dal (toor, arhar) | 10 g | IFCT 2017 B021 |
| Tomato, ripe, hybrid | 50 g | IFCT 2017 D075 |
| Tamarind pulp | 3 g | IFCT 2017 E064 |
| Red chillies, dry, whole 2 dry red chillies | 6.7 g | IFCT 2017 G022 |
| Chillies, green | 3.3 g | IFCT 2017 G008 |
| Ginger, fresh | 5 g | IFCT 2017 G014 |
| Coriander seeds (dhania) | 1.8 g | IFCT 2017 G024 |
| Black pepper | 0.5 g | IFCT 2017 G031 |
| Groundnut oil half a teaspoon | 2.25 g | IFCT 2017 T005 |
| Water 1.25 cups | 300 g | no calories |
Sources
- ICMR-NIN, Indian Food Composition Tables 2017. Red gram dal (B021), tomato, tamarind pulp (E064), red chillies (G022), green chilli, ginger, coriander seeds, black pepper, oil, rice raw (A015); values read from github.com/nodef/ifct2017
- Vijayakumar et al., Indian Nutrient Databank (INDB), Current Developments in Nutrition, 2024. Basic Food Preparation recipe BFP176, rasam with tamarind
Questions people ask
How many calories are in 1 cup of rasam?
About 50 in a 200 ml katori, and about 40 in a 150 ml tumbler.
How many calories are in rasam rice?
About 210 for a 200 ml katori of rasam with a 200 ml katori of plain rice. Most of that is the rice.
How much protein is in rasam?
About 2 g in a 200 ml katori. Rasam has little dal, so it's not a large source.
How many calories are in 100 g of rasam?
About 25.