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Takeaway lovers are being warned to cut back on their favourite dinners after researchers found the meals contained high and wildly varying levels of salt and fat.
Butter chicken, a popular mild, creamy curry, topped the fat survey, with one sample containing 22.8g of total fats in 100g of curry - more than double the amount of the least fatty butter chicken.
Beef and black bean stir-fry was on average the saltiest of the nine kinds of dishes. The average serving gave consumers 4290mg of sodium - well over the Health Ministry's recommended daily adult limit of 2300mg.
Levels of sodium - the unhealthy part of salt - were even more variable than fat, ranging from 88mg in 100g in the least salty plate of sweet and sour pork, to 439.5mg/100g in the saltiest.
Previous research found plain-cut potato chips from independent shops had 9.7g of fat in 100g, while KFC fried crumbed chicken thighs had 27.8g of fat and 490mg of sodium in 100g.
Dietitian Rob Quigley said yesterday people should consider all takeaways, not just ethnic fast food, as a treat to be eaten monthly at most.
But the new study showed choosing a lower-fat takeaway meal was "like Russian roulette - good luck, you'll need it.
"It shows how important simple labels such as a traffic light system could be. For the salt content, nearly all of the meals exceeded a person's daily maximum intake, so no Russian roulette there; everyone gets shot."
The study of 44 Thai, Indian and Chinese takeaway meals by Crop & Food Research, part of its wider, ongoing analyses of the composition of hundreds of foods, was presented to the Dietetic Association Conference in Christchurch this week.
Study author Jason McLaughlin said nearly a third of the population ate fastfood at least once a month and we spent a quarter of our food budget on takeaways. From 2004 to 2005, the fish and chip, ethnic food, hamburger and chicken takeaways category grew 17 per cent.
A Herald-DigiPoll survey in 2005 found Asian food was New Zealand's most popular takeaway, slightly ahead of fish and chips.
Auckland District Health Board dietitian Kate Sladden said it was hard for people to know how much salt and fat was in takeaways, although they could ask cooks to go light on the salt if the food was being cooked to order.
"The only thing to consider is to look for a dish that's got lots of colourful vegetables making up a big proportion of the meal. More vegetables will mean a lower fat and energy content."
She said the Healthy Kai projects in four suburbs excluded curries from the endorsed menus because of their higher levels of fat and energy and lower vegetable content.
