India - food

While our three week winter trip to southern India was awesome in many ways, food was always foremost in our minds, whether our bellies were happily full, angry at the ever-present hot peppers, or eager for more.


Order a "meals" and this is what you get. Nicer places on metal, most places on banana leaf. Spoons for children and foreigners; civilized people use the fingers of their right hand.

Falafel-like thing we bought mostly on trains.

Masala Dosa. A crispt pancake-like treat made of lentil and rice flour and yogurt, filled with potatoes and veggies, sauces for dipping. You can eat them for breakfast or dinner.

Snack mixes. Mostly fried lentil-flour noodle-like things.


Various fried street snacks.


Ghee roast, which is really just a tall buttery dosa. You break pieces of the buttery, crisp pancake and dip into various coconut sauces - breakfast or dinner.


Street cart of various beans, yuca, corn - evening street food. They fill a newspaper cone according to the amount of money you want to spend and then you just tip it into your mouth.

Puri, a fried puff of dough. Very light and airy and usually a breakfast item.

Pongal, a rice-mush flavored with a lot of peppercorn - eaten for breakfast mostly. It can be served sweet as well.

A bewildering variety of bananas. The trick with bananas seems to be (and isn't it the case with most produce?) that the smallest ones taste the best.