How traditional Indian diets optimise protein intake

Traditional Indian dietary practices got it right centuries ago when legumes, beans, vegetables, yoghurt and grains began being eaten together in one meal. There are several plant sources proteins, but except for soy, most are “incomplete proteins” because they are missing one or more of nine essential amino acids, the building blocks of protein. Since even incomplete plant proteins have some essential amino acids, mixing proteins from different plant sources in the same meal – as is done in most traditional cuisines across regions – makes the dietary protein intake complete to boost health. For meat-eaters, the best sources of protein are meat, poultry, dairy products, eggs and fish because animal produce naturally contains all the nine essential amino acids -- histidine, isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan and valine – needed by the body. Not enough Vegetarians have a particularly higher chance of being deficit in protein and several other nutrients missing in plant foods, such as Vitamin B12 found mainly in fish, meat, poultry and dairy products; Vitamin D in oily fish, eggs and dairy; docosahexaenoic acid in fatty fish; and zinc and haeme-iron predominantly found in red meats, from where it is better absorbed than from non-haeme plant sources.