Calories in Mutton Seekh Kebab

The recipe mixes 100 g of mutton mince with 30 g of onion, 30 g of lemon and spices and shapes it into 4 kebabs, so each one holds 25 g of mince. That is a short, thin kebab, closer to a cocktail seekh than to the full-length one that comes off a restaurant skewer. No oil or ghee is listed in the recipe; the fat in the figure is the mince's own. A restaurant seekh is larger, is usually made from fattier mince so it stays juicy, and is basted with butter or ghee. Count by the weight of meat: 60 kcal for every 25 g of mince.

Fat supplies 57% of the energy, protein 34% and carbohydrate 9%. Both the fat and the protein come from the mutton: mince is ground with some of the animal's fat, which is why a kebab with no added oil still gets more than half its energy from fat. The 5.1 g of protein in a kebab is a good amount for 60 kcal. The onion and lemon add the trace of carbohydrate and the 0.8 g of fibre.

A single seekh of this size is about 3% of a sedentary man's daily energy requirement and 4% of a woman's. Three of them, 180 kcal and 15.3 g of protein, make a starter or the protein in a light meal with a roti and salad. As a roll, the paratha and the sauces usually outweigh the kebab inside. Kebabs have almost no carbohydrate and little fibre, so onion rings, cucumber and a squeeze of lemon on the side do useful work. At a party it is one of the easier starters to count: so many kebabs, so much meat.

The figure is small because the kebab is small, not because seekh kebab is a low-fat food: 57% of its energy is fat, and a restaurant seekh has more meat and usually more fat than this recipe. Shop-bought and frozen kebabs are also salted more heavily than a home recipe such as this one. People with a heart condition or raised cholesterol should follow their doctor's or dietitian's guidance on red meat.