Calories in Besan Ladoo

The recipe roasts 50 g of besan and 10 g of suji in 30 g of ghee, mixes in 50 g of castor sugar and shapes 4 ladoos. One ladoo therefore holds 12 g of besan, 12 g of sugar and 7.5 g of ghee: equal parts flour and sugar, bound with ghee, where a teaspoon of ghee is about 5 g. That is a ladoo small enough to sit in a closed fist. Sweet shops often roll them larger, and at home the size changes with every handful. Among the 20 sweets compared here this is the 5th lightest, level with rava ladoo at 169 kcal and a little above besan barfi at 162 kcal.

Carbohydrate supplies 51% of the energy, fat 42% and protein 7%. Sugar makes up the larger part of the carbohydrate: the ladoo has 13.3 g of sugars in 22.1 g of carbohydrate. The fat is ghee. Besan adds 3.1 g of protein and 1.6 g of fibre, which is more than a flour like maida would bring but not enough to change what a ladoo is. Each one is a compact package of flour, sugar and ghee in close to equal measure.

A besan ladoo of this size supplies about 8% of a sedentary man's daily energy requirement and 10% of a woman's. Two are 336 kcal and three are 504 kcal with 24 g of fat, which is how a plate of ladoos during a festival week quietly adds up. A ladoo is flour, sugar and ghee; it is an energy food and nothing more. One with a cup of unsweetened tea or a glass of milk is a reasonable evening snack. Half a ladoo, about 84 kcal, is enough when it comes at the end of a full lunch.

A single ladoo has 13.3 g of sugars and 8 g of fat, the fat being ghee. Neither is alarming on its own; the catch is that ladoos are kept in a tin within reach for days after a festival, and shop ladoos are frequently larger than the one measured. People with diabetes should take their doctor's or dietitian's advice on sweets and not assume that a besan-based ladoo is a safer choice than any other.