If India were a buffet, you’d need a map, a strategy, and a few stretchy pants because there’s no such thing as “just a taste” in this country. Growing up, I thought I understood Indian food. My mother’s rajma chawal, my neighbour’s biryani, the samosas from that one uncle’s shop down the lane — wasn’t that India on a plate? Then I travelled. And what I discovered was that Indian food is not a single cuisine. It’s a 5,000-year-old conversation between land, language, culture and climate. Every state, every district has a voice, a recipe, a story.
love equals butter
Food isn’t just served — it’s celebrated, loud and proud, with a kind of generosity that feels like it’s been simmering for generations. I remember sitting on a charpai in a mustard field near Ludhiana, surrounded by cousins I’d just met, as a meal was laid out that looked less like lunch and more like a family festival. There was sarson da saag, still bubbling from the fire it had cooked on since morning, earthy and deep, paired with makki di roti slathered in ghee and topped with a scoop of white butter so indulgent it felt like a dare.
Nearby, tandoori chicken crackled on an open flame, its charred edges perfumed with smoke and spice. Plates were optional; fingers were encouraged. The air smelled of mustard flowers, wood smoke and slow joy. A steel tumbler of lassi was handed to me — cold, thick, and sweet enough to qualify as dessert — and after the last bite, I lay back in the winter sun, eyes heavy and smiling for no reason other than the kind of happiness that only comes when you’re fed by people who cook like they love you.
From Fields to Streets
If Punjab fed me like family, Delhi fed me like a dare. My first real bite of Delhi came on a crowded winter afternoon in Chandni Chowk, where the air was thick with the scent of frying oil, car horns and roasted spices. I followed my nose to a tiny chaat stall that looked like it hadn’t moved since the Mughals. The vendor handed me a paper plate of aloo tikki chaat, still sizzling, drenched in chutney and yoghurt, and topped with a mountain of crisp sev.
I took a bite, and everything else disappeared — sound, traffic, time. It was hot, cold, sweet, sour, crunchy, soft — a culinary collision course that didn’t just wake up my taste buds; it punched them awake. My eyes watered, my nose ran, and just as I was about to give up, the vendor looked at me, grinned, and said: “Thoda aur masala?” That was intense, relentless, and unforgettable.
One day you’re eating chole bhature the size of a satellite dish for breakfast. Next, you’re in Old Delhi, tasting kebabs that melt mid-sentence, served from a kitchen that’s been around longer than electricity. The food here mirrors the city itself — layered, fast, chaotic, occasionally overwhelming, but always brimming with story.
From the heat and hustle of Delhi, I travelled westward into the heart of the desert — Rajasthan, where food taught me that scarcity breeds brilliance. I shared a meal with a family in a small village near Jodhpur. There was no fridge, no running water and yet, the food tasted like it had been passed down through fire and wind. Dal Baati Churma, sun-dried ker sangri and pickles aged in clay jars under the desert sun — this was survival cuisine turned regal. Every bite felt like it carried the resilience of the land.
Here, cooking is preservation — not just of food, but of tradition. Ingredients are dried, fermented, pickled, spiced and sun-soaked to withstand the heat. And yet, the flavours are never harsh. They’re bold, earthy, and full of unexpected tenderness.
But nothing prepared me for Kashmir. If Punjab fed me with fire and Rajasthan with grit, Kashmir fed me with poetry. I once attended a wazwan, the legendary 36-course feast reserved for weddings and grand occasions. Each dish — from rogan josh to yakhni to the velvety meatballs of gushtaba — arrived like a handwritten letter. No rush, no noise, just reverence.
The fragrant kahwa tea, sprinkled with almonds and saffron, closed the meal like a blessing. It felt like stepping into a world where food and friendship were inseparable.
Everything about the meal was sacred — the copper plates, the hand-washing ritual, the silent respect between the cooks and the guests. In Kashmir, being fed isn’t a transaction. It’s a ceremony. And every dish tells you, without words, “You are welcome. You matter.”
Spice dance
The South offered a different kind of intensity — subtler, sharper, and more soulful. It didn’t shout. It whispered in layers. I first truly understood this in Tamil Nadu, over a plate of Chettinad chicken that nearly made me cough — not from heat, but complexity. The spices didn’t just punch you in the mouth; they waltzed. Each note of cinnamon, pepper, fennel — choreographed with precision. That’s the secret of South Indian food: it’s not just spicy. It’s spiritual.
Your mornings here start soft — with idlis and sambar. But that calm is a prelude. Try any of their 47 rasams and you’re diving into broths that are part sermon, part science — sour with tamarind, scented with garlic, spiked with pepper. I remember sitting cross-legged in a temple town, watching monks bless the food before it was served. It was entirely vegetarian — and yet it roared with flavours. You don’t leave Tamil Nadu full. You leave altered.
From there, I drifted west — and Kerala felt like an exhale. A rainy afternoon. A backwater breeze. A boatman humming under his breath. And in front of me, a meal that felt like it had been written just for that moment: Karimeen Pollichathu, pearl spot fish steamed in banana leaf, served alongside appam and a coconut milk stew so gentle it was like being sung to. “If your fish isn’t fresh,” my host told me, “your day is wasted.” I believed him. Every bite here felt like the coast had spoken — quiet, proud, and unmistakably alive.
But the calm didn’t last. Andhra Pradesh greeted me like a slap on the tongue and a smile right after. I mistook gongura pickle for a harmless side. Ten minutes later, I was bargaining for buttermilk in broken Telugu. Here, food doesn’t flirt with heat. It marries it. The tamarind-rich biryanis, the sharp tang of sorrel leaves, the unapologetic use of chilli — everything is bold and unashamed. It wasn’t just flavour. It was pride on a plate.
Then, as if to restore balance, Karnataka arrived — the quiet mediator of the South. I met an elderly couple in Mysuru who ran a dosa stall that had stood for 40 years. Their Mysore masala dosa, came with not one but three chutneys. “Each chutney is for a different mood,” the woman told me, smiling. Paired with a tumbler of filter coffee, thick and sweet with milk, it was the kind of meal that asked nothing of you — except to slow down and be present.
Flavour Has Memory
From Karnataka’s warmth, I headed east — and the transition was not just geographic. It was emotional.
Bengal was the first place that made me feel like food could remember. My first Bengali meal was in someone’s home. Ilish maach in mustard, mishti doi, rice that shimmered like poetry. Bengalis don’t eat for hunger. They eat for beauty. And meals here aren’t just eaten — they unfold, like operas. Bitter begins the story. Savory moves it forward. And sweet — oh, sweet — brings you home. Between courses, there are debates: about fish, literature, football and occasionally politics. But food always wins.
In Odisha, the volume turned down, but the reverence turned up. I stood in the temple kitchens of Jagannath in Puri, watching hundreds of volunteers prepare thousands of meals in complete silence. No garlic. No onion. Just sacred food, slow-cooked in earthen pots over wood fire. I tasted dalma, chhena poda — a caramelised cheese dessert born from a kitchen mishap — and I realised: even mistakes here become traditions.
Further Northeast, in Assam, food wore the mood of the monsoon. I arrived during the rains, and everything felt soft and slowed. Their masor tenga, a sour fish curry was light, broth-y and healing. But the dish that stopped me in my tracks was khar — made from sun-dried banana peels and alkaline water. It was strange, subtle, and comforting.
a Plot Twist
After the mellow richness of the east, the west spun me around like a plot twist I never saw coming.
I used to think Gujarati food was just sweet. Then I tried a Kathiawadi thali — and cried. Undhiyu, cooked underground with winter vegetables, tasted like warmth and soil. Every dish — every farsan, every kadhi, every puffed grain — felt like a contradiction: sweet, salty, sour, spicy. “We balance everything,” a local told me. “Even moods.” And honestly, that thali lifted mine.
Maharashtra was full of surprises. In Mumbai, I grabbed a vada pav between trains and it hit like a shot of espresso. But head south to Konkan, and the flavour palette softens into coconut and kokum. In Pune, I had misal pav so hot it made my ears ring, and later, a warm puran poli that reminded me of Diwali afternoons as a child — sweet, soft, golden with ghee.
And then came Goa. Or rather, I stumbled into it and never wanted to leave. There was a beach shack, a live band, and a bowl of vindaloo that tasted like the Portuguese had left behind their drama and spice. Bebinca, feni — Goan cuisine is not a meal. It’s a festival.
Forgotten Flavours
Deep in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, I discovered a cuisine hidden from menus, preserved in memories. Tribal dishes like bhutte ka kees — grated corn cooked with spices felt like tasting history. I sat on a cot in a Bastar village, eating rice and wild greens with my hands, the simplicity of it tasting like time itself. Here, the ancient flavours of mahua flower liquor and bamboo shoot curries tell stories that are to be preserved.
Culinary Secret
My first trip to Nagaland rewired my taste buds. Fermented soybeans offered an earthy, funky, primal experience unlike any other. In Manipur, eromba, mashed vegetables with chilli and dried fish, danced on the edge of sour and spicy. In Meghalaya, the jadoh—rice cooked with pork and black sesame has flavours that can’t be replicated. They must be lived.
To say, “I love Indian food”, is to say you’ve tasted all of it — and none of it. The better question is: Which India have you eaten? Because in this country, food isn’t just regional. It’s emotional. It’s ancestral and infinite.
Vidisha Bathwal is the founder of Paprika Gourmet, an artisanal catering service brand in Calcutta. She’s also a passionate foodie and a fitness enthusiast.