A fitness coach on what Indian families can add to the festival table this Diwali, instead of what to give up.
BY ANISH AGARWAL*
Diwali food is not the problem. It comes once a year, it is made with love, and nobody should spend the evening counting calories.
What usually goes wrong is the balance. A festival plate is mostly mithai and fried snacks, with very little protein next to them.
Fried food is already a regular part of Indian eating, festival or not. In a sample of our members’ food logs from April to October 2026, about 1 in 5 fully logged days included a deep-fried item. On those days, a median 33% of calories came from fat, against 29% on days without one. And lunch, not snacks, carried the most fried food: 36% of deep-fried items, against 20% eaten as snacks.
So the goal this Diwali is not to remove the puris and pakoras. It is to add what the plate is missing.
Eat the protein and vegetables first
The order you eat in can matter. In a small study at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York, 11 adults with type 2 diabetes ate the same meal on two days. When they ate the chicken and vegetables first and the bread and orange juice 15 minutes later, their blood sugar an hour after eating was 37% lower than when they ate the carbs first.
It was a small study, but the habit costs nothing. Fill the first plate with paneer, salad and chana chaat, then go back for the rest.
Put one protein dish on every festival table
One or two dishes are enough to balance a Diwali spread:
Paneer tikka, grilled or air-fried, in place of a second fried starter.
Chana chaat or a sprouts salad.
A big bowl of raita. Plain Greek yogurt does the same job.
Tandoori chicken, fish tikka or boiled eggs, if your family eats them.
If you are taking a dish to a Diwali potluck, make it one of these. The host will have the sweets covered.
Dal counts too, but as I wrote here earlier this month, one bowl of dal gives less protein than most people think. Put a katori of curd or paneer next to it.
Fix the snack hour
Diwali evenings mean hours of snacking: at home, at a friend’s place, at the temple. Snacks are already the weakest meal for protein. In our members’ food logs, only 36% of snacks reached 20 g of protein, against 69% of dinners.
If you are hosting, put a bowl of roasted chana, makhana or nuts next to the namkeen, and a plate of paneer cubes or boiled eggs where people can reach them.
Enjoy the sweets after a meal
Have the kaju katli or gulab jamun you love most, and have it after a meal rather than on an empty stomach between visits. Pick your favourite and skip the ones you only eat because the box is open.
Walk after the big dinner
A 2022 review of seven trials found that breaking up long sitting with short, light walks lowered blood sugar and insulin after meals, compared with sitting still. So after the main Diwali dinner, step out with the family for a short walk to see the lights, or get up and move between rounds of cards.
Add, don’t subtract
Diwali is about family, not food rules. Keep the sweets, keep the pakoras, and add three things: one protein dish, a better order on the plate, and a walk after dinner. That is enough to balance the festival plate without giving up anything you love.
If you want to check the portions on your plate, our free Indian food calorie calculator measures in katoris: https://www.yourtrainer.in/indian-food-calorie-calculator. The food log data behind this piece is here: https://www.yourtrainer.in/research#cholesterol
*About the author: Anish Agarwal is a NASM-certified personal trainer and the founder of YourTrainer, Bengaluru, where coaches and nutritionists train Indian families in India, the US, the UK, Canada and the UAE over live video. Instagram: @yourtrainer.fit
Sources:
Shukla AP, Iliescu RG, Thomas CE, Aronne LJ. Food order has a significant impact on postprandial glucose and insulin levels. Diabetes Care. 2015;38(7):e98-e99. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26106234/
Buffey AJ, Herring MP, Langley CK, Donnelly AE, Carson BP. The acute effects of interrupting prolonged sitting time in adults with standing and light-intensity walking on biomarkers of cardiometabolic health in adults: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Sports Medicine. 2022;52(8):1765-1787. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35147898/
YourTrainer. Fried food and dietary fat in a sample of member food logs, April to October 2026. https://www.yourtrainer.in/research#cholesterol
YourTrainer. Protein by meal in a sample of member food logs, compared with India’s ICMR-INDIAB survey. https://www.yourtrainer.in/blog/indian-diet-carbs-protein-icmr-vs-coached-food-logs
