Blog

Dal Calories: By Type and by the Cup

November 3, 2026 · Viral Tandel

Dal calories sound like they should have one clean answer, until you realize "dal" covers a whole category of lentil preparations rather than one specific dish. This guide gives the sourced figure USDA publishes for cooked dal, compares it against two other common legumes, and explains why the tadka usually matters more than which lentil went into the pot.

Key takeaways

• A cup (240 g) of cooked dal is 348 kcal, with 20.6 g protein, 46.0 g carbs and 10.3 g fat, per USDA FoodData Central.
• USDA's dal entry is a general one, not broken down by lentil variety, so there is no separate sourced figure for toor, moong, masoor or chana dal specifically.
• Chickpeas (293 kcal per cup) and kidney beans (227 kcal per cup) both run lower than dal per cup in this corrected data, partly because those two entries specifically carry no added fat while dal's own entry is not restricted that way.
• The tadka, ghee or oil tempered with spices and poured over a finished dal, typically has more influence on the total than which lentil was used, and there is no verified per-tablespoon figure for it.
• Dal is one of the more protein- and fiber-dense options in Indian cooking, but its fat content depends heavily on how generously it was tempered, not on the lentil itself.

Dal, per 100 grams and by the cup

This figure covers dal as a general cooked-lentil dish. It is a genuinely useful reference point, and also, as the next section covers, not broken down any further than that.

What "by type" actually means with this data

Dal is not one lentil, it is a whole family: toor or arhar dal, moong dal, masoor dal, chana dal, and others, each with a slightly different composition and a different typical preparation. USDA FoodData Central's entry used here is for cooked dal generally, not split out by which lentil was used, which means this guide cannot honestly hand you a separate number for toor dal specifically versus moong dal specifically. Where a number is not sourced, this site's rule is to say so rather than guess, so for a specific lentil variety, the general dal figure above is the closest verified reference available, not a stand-in for a number that does not exist yet.

What this dataset can compare honestly is dal against two other common legume dishes that do have their own entries:

Dal carries the most protein, and, in this data, the most fat per cup of the three. Kidney beans are lowest across all three columns, with chickpeas in between. Worth being upfront about why: the chickpea and kidney bean entries are specifically described as no added fat, while dal's own entry is not restricted that way, so part of dal's higher fat and calorie total reflects a difference in what each entry represents, not proof that lentils are inherently richer than beans. None of the three is a clearly "better" choice in isolation; they behave differently enough in a daily total that it is worth knowing which one you actually ate rather than treating "legumes" as one interchangeable category.

The tadka: why it matters more than the lentil

Dal is almost always finished with a tadka, oil or ghee heated with cumin, mustard seed, garlic or other spices and poured over the dish just before serving. It gets stirred through rather than sitting visibly on top, which makes it easy to miss both in a photo and in a generic recipe entry.

There is no verified per-tablespoon ghee or oil figure in the two sources this site draws from, USDA FoodData Central and the restaurant chain datasets, so this guide is not going to invent one to make the tadka's effect feel more precise than it is. What can be said honestly is the direction of the effect: a dal finished with a light tadka and one finished with a heavier one can carry the same name and a meaningfully different fat and calorie total, more different than switching between toor and moong dal would produce on its own. If you measure your tadka with a spoon, log that spoon as its own item rather than trusting the base dal figure to already include it.

Logging dal accurately

Dal often shares a plate with rice, a bread, or a dosa in South Indian cooking, and each deserves its own logged line rather than one combined guess. See dosa calories and paratha calories for how those common pairings are sourced on this site, and logging Indian food in a calorie tracker for more on component-by-component logging generally. The Indian food calories guide puts dal alongside rice, bread and a vegetable side in one full plate example.

Next time dal is part of your meal, log it in KalTrack and add the tadka separately if you can estimate how much oil or ghee went in.

This is general information about tracking food, not medical advice. If you are managing a health condition or working to a clinical target, talk to your doctor or a registered dietitian before changing how you eat.