Meat, Grills & Lauk

How Many Calories in Manok Pansoh?

Manok Pansoh is a Sarawak Iban and Bidayuh chicken dish cooked inside a sealed bamboo tube over an open fire with lemongrass, ginger, garlic, torch ginger flower and cassava leaves, producing a fragrant, brothy result with almost no added oil.

210kcal / 1 serving (mixed bone-in chicken pieces with broth and aromatics)
One serving of Manok Pansoh (about 280g of bone-in chicken pieces, broth and aromatics) comes in at roughly 210 calories, with 32g protein, 7g carbs and 5g fat. That 5g of fat is mostly from the chicken itself, not from any oil added during cooking, because the bamboo seals everything in and the chicken essentially steams in its own juices. For a proper lauk, those are genuinely good numbers.

Nutrition facts

Per 1 serving (mixed bone-in chicken pieces with broth and aromatics) (280g)AmountPer 100g
Calories210 kcal75 kcal
Protein32 g11 g
Carbs7 g3 g
Fat5 g2 g

Where the calories come from

Bone-in chicken (mixed cuts, no skin, steamed in bamboo)140g
175 kcal
Aromatic broth (lemongrass, ginger, galangal, garlic, shallots)100g
20 kcal
Cassava/tapioca leaves (pucuk ubi)30g
12 kcal
Torch ginger flower and chilli10g
5 kcal

The real talk

Okay so first, let me put you on to this dish if you haven't had it before. Manok Pansoh is a traditional Iban and Bidayuh dish from Sarawak where chicken gets packed into a fresh bamboo tube with lemongrass, ginger, galangal, shallots, garlic, bungai kantan (torch ginger flower) and cassava leaves (pucuk ubi), then the whole thing goes over a fire until it's cooked. No wok, no oil, no frying. The bamboo keeps everything moist and adds a faint smoky, grassy aroma that you cannot replicate any other way. At 210 calories for a 280g serving, most of that comes from the 140g of bone-in chicken (175 cal). The broth is basically free at 20 cal, the pucuk ubi adds 12 cal and the aromatics are 5 cal. It's genuinely one of the leanest ways to eat chicken you'll find in any Malaysian cuisine. Fair warning though: these numbers are a ballpark estimate because hard nutritional data for traditional Borneo dishes is thin, so treat 210 as an honest best guess rather than a lab-verified figure.

What actually moves the number is the chicken cut. If you're getting a version with a lot of thigh or drumstick versus mostly breast, the fat can creep up a bit, maybe 230 to 250 calories per serving instead of 210. The broth is not really an issue calorie-wise unless someone has added coconut milk to it, which is not traditional but does happen at certain restaurants, and that can push it closer to 280 to 320 calories. Portion size matters too: the standard festival or warung serving is roughly 280g but if you're getting a generous plate with extra broth, you might be looking at 350g, which would put you around 260 calories. The good news is there's basically no way to make this dish high-calorie accidentally if you're eating it in its traditional form, no oil, no coconut milk, bone-in skinless chicken, lots of aromatics and cassava leaves.

Manok Pansoh variants, ranked by calories

VariantCaloriesNotes
Manok Pansoh Halia (heavy ginger variant)210 kcalSame base, extra ginger load; negligible calorie difference, same macro profile
Manok Pansoh standard (lemongrass, garlic, bungai kantan)210 kcalClassic baseline recipe, no added oil
Manok Pansoh Cili (chilli-heavy variant)215 kcalAdditional bird's eye chillies; slightly more carbs from chilli, essentially same calories

How to eat it lighter

Common questions

How many calories in Manok Pansoh?
A standard serving of Manok Pansoh (about 280g, bone-in chicken with broth and aromatics) has around 210 calories, with 32g protein, 7g carbs and 5g fat. These are estimates because solid nutritional data for this traditional Sarawak dish is hard to find, but 210 is a reasonable ballpark.
What exactly is Manok Pansoh and is it healthy?
Manok Pansoh is a traditional Iban and Bidayuh dish from Sarawak where chicken is cooked inside a bamboo tube over fire with lemongrass, ginger, garlic, torch ginger flower and cassava leaves. Because there's no added oil and the chicken steams in its own juices, it's genuinely one of the healthiest ways to eat chicken in Malaysian cooking. High protein, low fat, no deep frying involved.
How does Manok Pansoh compare calorie-wise to other chicken dishes?
Manok Pansoh at 210 calories per serving is on the lower end for a chicken lauk. Ayam goreng (fried chicken) can be 280 to 350 calories for a similar weight. Kari ayam with coconut milk gravy easily hits 300 to 400 calories per serving. Pansoh's no-oil bamboo cooking method genuinely keeps the calorie count low compared to most other ways Malaysians cook chicken.

Related foods

See all Meat, Grills & Lauk calories, ranked →

Calorie and macro figures are estimates for a typical hawker or kopitiam serving. Actual numbers vary by stall, recipe and portion size. Use them as a guide, not gospel.

New to all this? Read how I went from 128kg to 86kg without cutting rice →

Want to know how many calories you actually need?
Use The Calculator