India GOWhat to eat in Kolkata
Rosogolla
West Bengal holds the geographical tag for the Banglar Rosogolla, and Odisha has never accepted it. Order one and you have taken a side.
Nolen Gur Sandesh
Winter only: nolen gur is date-palm sap tapped in the cold months, and the whole city's sweet shops change their menu around it.
Mishti Doi
Yogurt set with caramelised jaggery in a clay pot, which draws out the water and leaves it dense. Bengal's answer to dessert.
Puchka
Not pani puri: darker water, more tamarind, and the last one is given free with dry masala.
Shukto
A mildly bitter vegetable stew (bitter gourd, drumstick, raw banana) thickened with milk and mustard. It opens a Bengali meal, and the bitterness is the point: it is meant to wake the palate up.
Aloo posto
Potato cooked in a paste of ground poppy seed, pale, nutty and almost sweet, with nothing to distract from it. The most Bengali dish there is, and the one that sounds like nothing until you eat it.
Dhokar dalna
Chana-dal cakes cut into diamonds, fried, then simmered in a light ginger-cumin gravy. Bengali vegetarian cooking at its most formal: a dish for guests, made without onion or garlic.
Luchi & alur dom
White flour puris fried until they balloon, pale rather than golden, with a spiced potato curry made without onion or garlic. Bengal's festival breakfast and the Vaishnava kitchen's standard.
Kathi roll
A paratha cooked with egg or plain, filled with paneer or vegetables, wrapped in paper and eaten standing. Invented on Park Street so that office workers could carry a kebab without a plate.
Basanti Pulao
Yellow Bengali rice, sweet rather than savoury: short-grain gobindobhog with ghee, turmeric, cashews and raisins. The festive stand-in for plain rice.
Mochar Ghonto
Banana blossom chopped fine and cooked down with coconut and potato. Preparing it takes longer than eating it (the blossom is cleaned petal by petal), which is why it shows up at weddings and pujas more often than on a weekday table.
Firni
Ground-rice pudding set in a clay dish, scented with cardamom and rose. Thinner and cooler than kheer.
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