Wheat (whole, suji and dalia): nutrition per 100 g

1. 01

   Thiamine from the germ

   Whole wheat has 0.46 mg thiamine per 100 g, 2nd of 14 cereals and millets and 15th of 239 foods. 100 g covers about 26 per cent of a man's daily requirement.

2. 02

   Vitamin E, rare in grains

   At 0.6 mg vitamin E per 100 g, whole wheat ranks 2nd in its group, behind only quinoa. Most of it sits in the wheat germ.

3. 03

   Fibre and protein together

   Whole wheat has 11.2 g dietary fibre and 10.6 g protein per 100 g. It covers about 20 per cent of a man's daily protein and ranks 6th for protein among the 14 grains.

4. 04

   Zinc, calcium and potassium

   Whole wheat gives 2.85 mg zinc, 39 mg calcium and 366 mg potassium per 100 g, ranking 3rd, 4th and 4th in its group.

Values per 100 g of the edible portion. Source: Longvah T, Ananthan R, Bhaskarachary K, Venkaiah K. Indian Food Composition Tables 2017. National Institute of Nutrition, Indian Council of Medical Research, Hyderabad. Daily-need shares use the ICMR-NIN 2020 recommended dietary allowances for a 65 kg man and a 55 kg woman doing sedentary work (ICMR-NIN brief note). Nutrients IFCT did not analyse for this food are left out rather than shown as zero.

• Dalia: broken wheat cooked into a savoury khichdi with moong dal and vegetables, or a sweet porridge with milk and jaggery.
• Upma and rava dosa: suji roasted dry, then cooked with a mustard and curry leaf tadka or mixed into a thin batter.
• Semiya upma and seviyan kheer: vermicelli roasted in ghee and cooked savoury with vegetables or sweet in milk.
• Lapsi: Gujarati broken wheat cooked with ghee, jaggery and cardamom for festivals.
• Gothambu payasam: whole wheat cooked slowly with jaggery and coconut milk, a Kerala temple sweet.

Wheat in every form contains gluten, so dalia, suji and semiya are off the menu for people with coeliac disease. The fibre figures IFCT 2017 gives for semolina and vermicelli are close to the whole grain's, which is unusually high for products made from the inner part of the grain; treat those numbers with some caution. The iron trend is clear, though, falling from 3.97 mg in the whole grain to 2.02 mg in vermicelli. Sooji halwa and seviyan kheer carry generous ghee and sugar, so they are sweets, not breakfast cereals.

Food composition is general information, not a diet plan. Anyone managing a medical condition should plan their diet with a doctor or a registered dietitian.

• Wheat flour (atta and maida)

  Nutrition per 100 g, from IFCT 2017.

• Barley

  Nutrition per 100 g, from IFCT 2017.

• Jowar (sorghum)

  Nutrition per 100 g, from IFCT 2017.

• Green gram (moong)

  Nutrition per 100 g, from IFCT 2017.

• Ghee

  Nutrition per 100 g, from IFCT 2017.

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