Help calculate the calories in my favorite NYC street food: lamb over rice.

August 19, 2009 10:38 AM

Help calculate the calories/fat in my favorite NYC street food: lamb over rice.

So, I am watching what I eat, but there are certain things I'd like to indulge on once in a while, as long as I know the size of the crime I am committing, I think I am ok.

One of these things is lamb over rice. If you ever had it (and if you live in NYC you probably have) this is a styrofoam container filled with:

1) About 3-4 cups of cooked yellow rice
2) A good portion of what I think is chopped gyro meat, I cant really quantify it, but it looks like 1/2-1 cup
3) A very tiny lettuce salad
4) All this covered on a white sauce that's either Tzatziki or Tahini, but I think it's the former (it may be something else).

(I am talking about this)

First, I'm having a hard time quantify the amount of gyro meat that go into these things. Is the sauce really tzatziki? Also does anyone have any idea of the calorie/fat count of any of the meat and sauce?

Thanks!

posted by falameufilho to food & drink (9 comments total)

I've eaten my share and have no idea how to figure that out, but I would bet that the real calorie bomb is actually the rice, which is probably cooked and soaked in flavored butter or oil.
posted by RandlePatrickMcMurphy at 11:04 AM on August 19

From CalorieCount:

170.0g lamb, ground, cooked, broiled: 482 Calories
55.0g Iceberg Lettuce: 8 Calories
171.0g Yellow Rice: 570 Calories
50 grams Tzatiki Sauce: 27 Calories

Total: 1087 Calories

The basic weights may be off, and I know they add oil sometimes when grilling the gyro slices so the calorie count might go up from that as well. I'm assuming an equal ratio of rice to lamb here, which is probably not correct either, but this should give you a general estimate.
posted by scrutiny at 11:22 AM on August 19

I literally just finished mine a few minutes ago. I think the rice may be worse than that -- I agree it's cooked with something.
posted by The Bellman at 11:40 AM on August 19

I’m not sure whether the white sauce is included in the 680 calories that make up a lamb over rice platter. A good reporter would have asked… but like I said before- I really don’t want to know.

That 680 is for 100g, which, according to a commenter, is about 1/4 of the contents of the typical street meat styrofoam box.

More details in comments.
posted by notyou at 12:11 PM on August 19

@notyou - my favorite comment:

Some quick math: As posted, the sign says 100 grams of Gyro platter = 680 calories.

Platter probably weighs (conservative estimate) = 1 pound = 16 oz. = 435 g.

435 g is 4.35 times the posted calories on the sign.

4.35 x 680 = 2,958 calories.

About the same as 2 Quarter-Pounders with Cheese, a large fries and a large Strawberry Triple-Thick Shake.

That's not considering the white sauce. Ugh.
posted by falameufilho at 12:58 PM on August 19

I like the hot sauce on mine too. Good stuff.
posted by reptile at 1:43 PM on August 19

What I've done in the past with my favorite fast food meals is ask for things like white sauce on the side, then take the whole thing home and deconstruct it onto a plate on a kitchen scale, measuring each component as I remove it from the box and looking up near equivalents on CalorieCount.About.Com or DailyPlate.com. Assuming it's pretty much the same thing everywhere, or you get it from the same place each time, that'll get you close enough for government work.

My favorite bit of takeout -- a beef shawarma platter from the Turkish place near my house -- counted out as 1487 calories using that method. Needless to say, it's no longer my favorite bit of takeout.
posted by jacquilynne at 1:50 PM on August 19 [1 favorite has favorites]

Someone posted it to Daily Plate and here's more Midtown Lunch discussion.

And be careful of the white sauce. A lot of times it's not Tzatiki (which is yogurt based), it's mayo.

My nutritionist suggested to me to ask for more veggies and less rice to help pretend that it's healthy.
posted by mrsshotglass at 1:58 PM on August 19

I like jacquilynne's idea of deconstructing the dish and measuring it - especially because, since everyone probably gets food from the same cart every time, you only need to do it once.
posted by AnyGuelmann at 11:17 AM on August 20