Check weight with chickpeas

Chickpeas do not make you put on weight, but acts as protein in your diet

It seems quite unfortunate when people say that they are on a weight loss diet. It looks like they should only have salad leaves and tasteless foods and work out for hours together. It is totally wrong let me tell you that weight loss diet doesn’t means that you can not have food it just simply means that one must have healthy food avoid eating junk foods. People usually think consuming chickpeas can make them put on weight, but the fact says that having chickpeas does not add weight.

Chickpeas being from legumes family act as a protein in your diet. Chickpeas are also high in fiber and it helps to lower cholesterol hence good for heart health. Chickpeas are available all round the year and are quite easy to store. The dried chickpeas take long cooking time. Cooked chickpeas can be stored in refrigerator for three days in airtight container. Chickpeas are found in almost all Indian houses. It is also called as Bengal gram, ceci beans, chana, kala chana, and sanagalu and garbanzo beans. Some of the popular dishes are the Punjabi chole, Kabuli chana ki chaat and the Mediterranean hummus.

We must soak the chickpeas for at least 12- 24 hours before cooking them this prevents flatulence and makes them easy to digest. After that it can take 1-2 hours to cook in slow flame. If you pressure cooker it is cooked faster. If you over cook it will fall apart. A chickpea are low in Glycemic index and keeps you fuller for a longer time. It is good for diabetic patients due to being low in Glycemic index. As it keeps you full for longer time it prevents binge eating, therefore a dieters delight.

Chickpeas are good source of calcium, as a result good for your bones. There are two varieties of chickpeas one is called desi (local), and the other Kabuli. The desi is smaller darker with rougher coat and grows mainly in India Bangladesh, Mexico, Ethiopia and Iran. Kabuli is a lighter coloured pulse far larger than the desi and smoother. Mainly found in Southern Europe, Northern Africa, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Chile. During the 18th century it came to India.

The nutritional value of 100 grams cooked chickpeas is about 27.42g of carbohydrates, 4.8grams of sugar, 7.6grams of dietary fiber, 2.59grams of fats, 1.3mg of vitamin C, 49mg of calcium, 2.89mg of iron, 48mg of magnesium, 291mg of potassium, 7mg of sodium and 1.53mg of zinc. The caloric content over 100 grams is 164.

100 grams of chickpeas will give you a huge amount of chickpeas when cooked and if you add vegetables to it will be a dish by it self. So you can make a meal with chickpeas with vegetables and the entire meal can be a low caloric meal. Being a protein it’s always better that a natural form of vitamin C is added to it. Tomato, lemon, tamarind or Aamchur (dry mango powder) are some of the ingredients that you could add to it. This makes the protein easily absorbable.