Is Pancit Healthy? (3 Tips For Weight Loss)

Pancit is one of the most popular Filipino dishes as its amazing savory flavors pair wonderfully with the thin and chewy noodles.

Stir fry is one of the methods that Filipino chefs have mastered and it definitely shines when eating this dish.

Although Pancit is delicious, is it healthy? 

Pancit is a dish that has most of its calories coming from carbs and proteins so it can actually be a great meal to eat when dieting.

Especially when made at home, Pancit can be customized to be very optimal for weight maintenance and a healthy diet. 

In order to make sure Pancit is healthy, we must understand what goes inside of this noodle dish and ways we can make it healthier than the original recipe.

Pancit is similar to many Asian noodle dishes as it really acts as a canvas where we can change things according to what we seek nutritionally. 

Here are three steps you can take in order to eat Pancit while staying healthy:

1. Understand What Goes Inside Pancit 

2. Understand How Many Calories Are In Pancit 

3. Understand How To Stay Healthy While Eating Pancit 

Now that we know the three steps to eating our favorite Filipino dish while staying healthy, let’s take a deeper look into the specifics of what we can do.

Tip 1: Understand What Goes Inside Pancit 

Pancit is a very simple dish that uses a variety of different vegetables stir fried in a small amount of vegetable oil and marinated into a soy sauce and garlic mixture.

This makes for a healthy meal as the ingredients are simple and the calories can easily be controlled. 

Pancit can definitely be a good meal to eat when made at home but it can be harder to control if eaten at a typical Filipino restaurant.

The reason for this is because of the large amounts of fat you can find in the types of meat they use and the excess oil to make the dish more flavorful. 

The best thing to do when going outside to eat Pancit is to make go for a seafood or chicken breast option.

This will make sure that the fats stay low which will make the meals more balanced.

Balance is really key when staying healthy so make sure your diet isn’t coming from purely carbs and fats! 

As for the vegetables, it’s always best to have as much as you can. Vegetables are great for dieting as they allow us to be satiated as their fiber content is high.

This results in more food with less calories which is always a great strategy to implement when eating less calories. 

Our recommendation is to make Pancit when you can instead of eating it outside.

This leaves you in full control of the meal and will allow you to make something delicious that is also loaded with protein. Here is a recipe you can use if you’re looking to make a healthier version of Pancit. (1) 

Now that we know what goes inside a typical Pancit dish, let’s take a look at the importance of looking into the nutrition labels of our favorite foods. 

Tip 2: Understand How Many Calories Are In Pancit 

We now know what goes inside Pancit so let’s take a look at its nutrition label and see what we can find.

For every 11 grams of fat, there are 54 grams of carbs, and 28 grams of protein.

This ratio is not bad and is actually pretty sustainable when dieting but there is room for improvement. 

The good part about this dish is that it has a whopping 28 grams of protein per serving.

In many foods you can find the grams of carbs and fats to be higher than protein which is a huge setback to a healthy diet.

Here, we can see that carbs are the highest macronutrient as you can expect to find 54 grams per serving. 

This is fine because carbs are necessary for a healthy diet as they fuel our workouts and movements.

However, carbs should only be slightly higher than proteins or, even, at the same level of protein.

54 grams of carbs is almost double that of protein so it would be optimal if either protein was higher or carbs were lower. 

Fortunately, we can combat this by making sure our ratio of vermicelli noodles to lean proteins are at a 1:1 ratio (in serving sizes).

This will ensure that we get all the flavor and texture we need while keeping this dish favorable towards our diet. 

The second thing we can control is the type of meat we use.

There are certain Pancit recipes that call for the use of either pork or beef which can add a lot of additional fat to the dish.

Adding something like chicken breast or seafood would be the better option here as they are low in fat and even higher in protein. 

Protein is necessary when dieting as it allows us to retain muscle as we eat fewer calories.

It is also the most satiating macronutrient out of the three so you can really benefit from more protein in your diet. 

So, overall, adding more protein to this dish or lowering the carbs by limiting the noodles will really make this dish a great option for a healthy and balanced diet. 

Now that we know what the nutritional contents of Pancit are, let’s take a look at some of the steps we can take to eat Pancit while staying healthy. 

Tip 3: Understand How To Stay Healthy While Eating Pancit 

Staying healthy is really all about controlling portion sizes and making sure to properly utilize the calories we get from our foods.

Overeating is the cause of many health problems which can be avoided by tracking our food and filling them with a great balance of macronutrients. 

There is a concept called Energy Balance which compares the amount of calories consumed in a day to the amount of calories burned.

If calories consumed are higher than calories burned, then weight gain will occur as there is a surplus of energy.

If calories burned are higher than calories consumed, however, then weight loss will occur as there is a deficit of energy. 

If you are someone who wants to get lean while eating your favorite foods then it's important to make sure that calories burned are higher than calories consumed.

This can be obtained by understanding how many calories your body burns in a day (TDEE) and by tracking your foods to make sure your calories go below that number. 

If you want a more in depth guide on how you can find your daily calories and some steps you can take to get to your fitness goals, then make sure to check out this article where we talk about how you can get a six pack. 

https://www.aspirefitnesswalnut.com/how-to-actually-get-a-six-pack-after-30

The second thing we need to do while staying healthy is to make sure that our days are filled with activity and movement.

Within your TDEE there is something called TEPA (Thermic Effect of Physical Activity) which accounts for 15-30% of your calories burned. 

TEPA is how much energy is burned from activity which means you are in control of how many calories you burn in a day.

Staying active is key when dieting as it allows us to add more of our favorite foods which is necessary in order to create a good relationship with food. 

The best way we can increase our TEPA is by consistently working out and staying on schedule with our regimens.

Other than building muscle, working out achieves a higher muscle mass percentage on our bodies which translates to more calories burned at rest.

This means that, the more muscle we have, the more calories we burn by just living life. 

It can be intimidating to workout, however, so we’ve come up with a workout plan that will get things started for you.

It’s a basic plan but it will go over all the major muscle groups and will teach each of their functions.

Here is the workout plan listed below. 

WOMEN 

Monday (Full Upper): 

• Seated Shoulder Press: 4x20 

• Lateral Raises: 4x15

• Lat Pulldowns: 4x12

• Dumbbell Row: 3x10

• Dumbbell Fly: 3x10 

• Knee Push Ups: 4x20

• Weighted Crunches: 3x35 

Wednesday (Back/Hamstrings/Biceps) 

• Assisted Pull Ups: 3x10

• Lat Pulldowns: 4x12 

• Cable Row: 4x15

• Stiff Leg Deadlift: 4x15

• Hamstring Curl: 4x15

• Bicep Curls: 3x10

• Hammer Curls: 3x10

Friday: (Legs/Butt/Abs): 

• Squats: 5x5 

• Goblet Squats: 4x20

• Glute Bridge: 4x20

• Glute Kickbacks: 4x20 each leg

• Jump Squats: 4x20

• Weighted Crunches: 3x35 

• Leg Lifts: 3x35

MEN 

Mon: Chest, Shoulders, Triceps, Abs (Push Day) 

• Bench Press: 3 sets 10 reps

• Dumbbell Press: 4 sets 12 reps

• Shoulder Press: 3 sets 10 reps

• Lateral Raises: 3 sets 15 reps

• Triceps Rope Push Down: 3 sets 15 reps

• Cable Crunches: 4 sets 15 reps 

Wed: Legs & Abs

• Goblet Squats: 4 sets 20 reps

• Weighted Walking Lunges: 2 sets 20 steps

• Stiff Leg DeadLift (Romanian Deadlift): 4 sets 15 reps

• Glute Bridges With Weight: 4 sets 20 reps

• Jumping Squats With Resistance Bands: 5 sets 20 reps

• Weighted Sit Ups: 4 sets 25 reps

• Weighted Toe Touches: 4 sets 25 reps

Fri: Back & Biceps (Pull Day)

• Assisted Pull Ups: 3 sets 10 reps

• Lat Pulldowns: 4 sets 12 reps

• Dumbbell Rows: 4 sets 10 reps (Each Side)

• Seated Cable Rows: 4 sets 15 reps

• Bicep Curls: 3 sets 10 reps

• Hammer Curls: 3 sets 10 reps

The key here is to stay consistent and make sure to keep working for months or even years.

Muscle takes time to build and is a process that will greatly benefit your body in the long run.

It allows your body to burn more calories and it looks great too! 

Now that we know the importance of muscle we need to make sure we stay on track with our workouts.

Consistency and longevity are the two key factors when building muscle so there will be some commitment involved.

You can either go to the gym or build one for yourself.

It really just comes down to 3 pieces of equipment that you need to do most workouts.

These three are the workout bench, dumbbells, and gym flooring.

Check out our recommended gear page to see our best picks for these pieces of equipment here. 

https://www.aspirefitnesswalnut.com/home-workout-equipment

If a home gym is not for you then getting a membership somewhere works too.

As long as you are starting your muscle building journey, we’re happy! (1)

Stick with it for the long run and you’ll see how amazing the results can be. 

There It Is! 

In this article, we went over what goes inside your typical Pancit dish and what you can find inside the nutrition facts.

We learned that it will be beneficial to make your own Pancit as adding more protein to the dish will create a better balance of macronutrients. 

We also learned the benefit of working out and staying active which will help us build muscle and burn more calories in the long run. 

If you want to know more about your favorite foods and tips you can implement to stay healthy, then make sure to check out our other articles! 

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