Egg rolls are a great part of any Asian meal. They are most commonly enjoyed as part of Chinese cuisine and often are provided as standard when you order a certain amount of food.
Egg rolls come with a variety of fillings, all of which are delicious and moreish. However, if you are trying to watch your weight or control your portion sizes, you might want to know how many calories there are in an egg roll.
How Many Calories In An Egg Roll?
The amount of calories that are in an egg roll is dependent on the size of the egg roll, the filling, and how it has been cooked.
Whenever you purchase egg rolls to heat up at home or in a restaurant, you will be able to find out the number of calories in the product.
However, not all menus have calorie and other nutritional information available on them. For the purpose of this article, we will be focusing on standard egg rolls that are on the menu in Chinese restaurants across the country.
A single, standard egg roll, weighing around 89 grams contains around 222 calories. 95 of those calories come from fat which is around 43% of the egg roll.
A single, vegetable spring roll from a store that you heat in the oven, weighing 78 grams, contains around 166 calories. Around 29% of the calories are from fat.
For a pork egg roll that you heat at home, the calorie count increases to around 188 calories, 29% from fat.
Nutritional Profile Of An Egg Roll
Calories and fat aren’t the only things that should be taken into consideration. Using a standard, Chinese restaurant egg roll that weighs around 89 grams.
The protein content of a standard egg roll is around 7.4 grams. This is about ⅕ of the total product.
The fat content in this type of egg roll is around 10.6 grams. This is a high amount of fat for such a small item of food. However, as long as part of a special meal it isn’t a drastic amount.
Understandably, egg rolls are also high in carbohydrates. A standard restaurant egg roll contains around 24 grams of carbohydrates. This largely comes from the pastry and the oil that it is fried in.
The fiber content of the egg rolls is minimal at around 2.3 grams. A lot of this will come from the vegetables in the filling. One of the most important things to consider about egg rolls is the sodium content.
In a single egg roll, there is 417 mg of sodium. That is around 18% of an adult’s recommended intake which is quite a lot.
Potential Downsides Of Egg Rolls
Now that we know the nutritional profile of a delicious egg roll, it is time to look at some of the downsides of eating this food too regularly.
Sodium Content
As we mentioned above, egg rolls are incredibly high in sodium content. While a single roll may only have 18% of your recommended daily intake, the rest is easy to make up, especially at a Chinese restaurant.
Consuming a large amount of sodium on a regular basis can have a significant, negative impact on your overall health. One of the most drastic side effects is a change in your blood vessels.
This can lead to conditions such as high blood pressure and hypertension.
There are also cases where long-term consumption of excessive sodium has led to a diagnosis of stomach cancer, kidney stones, and osteoporosis.
All of these conditions can have a significant impact on your quality of life and your long-term health.
Consuming excessive amounts of sodium in the short term, such as for one special occasion is likely to only result in a minor amount of water retention the following day.
You may also feel more sluggish than normal until your body rehydrates properly.
Fat And Carbohydrate Content
The side effects of consuming excessive amounts of fat and carbohydrates can be just as severe as the side effects of too much sodium. Egg rolls are made up of mostly fat and carbohydrates in equal measure.
Consuming too much fat leads to conditions such as obesity and high cholesterol. You can also suffer from diabetes or pre-diabetes and even memory loss. In the most severe cases, excessive consumption of fat can lead to brain injury.
Consuming too many carbohydrates on a regular basis can also have negative effects on your health and well-being. Weight gain is the most common side effect of consuming an excessive amount of carbohydrates.
However, you can also begin to suffer from insulin resistance and multiple nutrient deficiencies. This can lead to a general decline in your overall health.
Frequently Asked Question
Are There Healthier Alternatives To Egg Rolls?
The easiest way to make sure that egg rolls are as healthy as they can be is to make sure that you are consuming them in moderation rather than on a regular basis.
However, if you enjoy eating these rolls often and don’t want to have to cut that down, you can also try to make your own egg rolls from scratch.
Making egg rolls yourself at home is a great way to control what goes into them and the size of them. This can be a great way to get your fix of egg rolls without the negative side effects that can come with them.
Final Thoughts
Egg rolls are a staple of Asian cuisine and many people would agree that a Chinese meal isn’t truly complete without them.
Consuming them in moderation is perfectly fine and there are a couple of ways that you can make this delicious food a little healthier.
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