Indian Cuisine
Most Indian cuisines are related by similiar usage of spices. Often, Indian cooking is distinguished by the use of a larger variety of vegetables than many other well-known cuisines. Within these recognisable similarities, there is an enormous variety of local styles.
In the north and the west, Kashmiri and Mughlai cuisines show strong central Asian influences. Through the medium of Mughlai food, this influence has propagated into many regional kitchens. To the east, the Bengali and Assamese styles shade off into the cuisines of East Asia.
All coastal kitchens make strong use of fish and coconuts. The desert cuisines of Rajasthan and Gujarat use an immense variety of dals and achars (preserves) to substitute for the relative lack of fresh vegetables. The use of tamarind to impart sourness distinguishes Tamil food. The Andhra kitchen is accused, sometimes unfairly, of using excessive amounts of chilies.
All along the northern plain, from Punjab through Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, a variety of flours are used to make chapatis and other closely related breads. In the rain-swept regions of the north-eastern foothills and along the coasts, a large variety of rices are used. Potatoes are not used as the staple carbohydrate in any part of India.
Modern India is going through a period of rapid culinary evolution. With urbanisation and the consequent evolution of patterns of living, home-cooked food has become simpler. Old recipes are recalled more often than used. A small number of influential cookbooks have served the purpose of preserving some of this culinary heritage at the cost of homogenising palates. Meanwhile restaurants, increasingly popular, encourage mixing of styles. Tandoori fish, mutton dosas and Jain pizzas are immediately recognisable by many Indians in cities.
Other Links
N means new link and B marks a broken link.
Indian regional cooking recipes
Andhra || Assamese || Bengali || Bihari || Goan || Gujarati || Kannada || Kashmiri || Konkani || Kutchhi || Maithili || Malayalee || Mangalorean || Marathi || Mewari || Mughlai || Oriya || Parsi || Punjabi || Sindhi || Tamil || Uttar Pradesh
The vocabulary of north Indian cuisine
is meant for those who want to know what Jaiphal means but don't know how to find out.
The Taste Makers: well known food writers
Tarla Dalal
the grande dame of Indian cholesterol shares her recipes. The megabytes of photographs of curry are liable to be costly on your internet budget.
Bitu Gaglani
shares the delights of traditional Indian chocolate recipes. Yes you read that right. Never heard of any, myself.
Jiggs KalraB
the pastiche man, shares Indian recipes with the unsuspecting public. Learn which pearls can be used to flavour your balsamic vinegar.
Sanjeev Kapoor's food page
is like his TV shows, and highly recommended. The page layouts are unnecessarily image heavy, but it is easy to navigate this site with images switched off. Go for it ...
Personal recipe collections
WWW Virtual Library: India: Recipes and Food
contains links to many recipe and food pages related to India. Last modified in late 1997, the usefulness of this page will decrease with time as links slowly disappear.
The Indology archivesB
contains a small discussion on the history of Indian food. More information on this topic is welcome.
Bawarchi.com
has product plugs for well-known brands of cooking oil and butter and is willing to let you share your recipes with them.
Pugmarks
should know better than making me download over a megabyte of data just to see the index of recipes. Gets the dodo award for design.
Delicious India
is also one of those sites overloaded with unnecessary graphics. But... it has content. Enjoy.
Gadnet
is a real fan's site; lots of links and a chat room for food. Work off all your calories with a few strokes of your fingers!
Chef on the Net
runs a recipe bank of French and Indian cuisine! If you tried every other link, try this as well; can't do any more harm.
Indian Express
the newpaper runs a cookery column. On the web this has transformed into a wonderful bank of recipes to which new ones are added regularly.
Sheela's South Indian Cooking
is a no-nonsense recipes page for the kind of south Indian food that has become popular all over the country. I cavil at calling Avial a side dish, but the recipe is fine.
Discussion forum- South Indian food
is fast becoming my favourite food page. Not just for the recipes (though there are a large number of them) but also for the whacko discussions on various aspects of southie food.
Kosher Indian Recipes
as the name suggests, collects together a large set of recipes which are acceptable as Kosher. I love this idea, and perhaps some of you out there could consult with the web masters to add more variety/spice to this collection.
Spices and Herbs
Homecooking: Herbs and SpicesN
This is the index page to some of the best written articles about herbs and spices-- their history, use and recipes which use them.
Herbs and SpicesN
This page from Netcook puts together a table of information on many different herbs and spices.
Spices as aphrodisiacsN
A enjoyable collection of folkways which delivers not only what the title promises, but also a lot of other information on spices. I found it a good read.