Wednesday 28 November 2012

Indian Cultural Food

Source:-(Google.com.pk)
Indian Cultural Food Biography
Some of India's foods date back five thousand years. The Indus Valley peoples (who settled in what is now northern Pakistan) hunted turtles and alligator, as well as wild grains, herbs and plants. Many foods from the Indus period (c. 3000–1500 B.C.) remain common today. Some include wheat, barley, rice, tamarind, eggplant and cucumber. The Indus Valley peoples cooked with oils, ginger, salt, green peppers, and turmeric root, which would be dried and ground into an orange powder .
The Aryan-speaking peoples who entered India between 1500 and 1000 B.C used leafy vegetables, lentils, and milk products such as yogurt and ghee (clarified butter). The Aryans also used spices such as cumin and coriander. Black pepper was widely used by 400 A.D. The Greeks brought saffron, while the Chinese introduced tea. The Portuguese and British made red chili, potato and cauliflower popular after 1700 A.D.
Perhaps the biggest contributors to India's culinary heritage are the Muslim peoples from Persia and present-day Turkey, who began arriving in India after 1200.
Read more: http://www.foodbycountry.com/Germany-to-Japan/India.html#b#ixzz2DZipBRttGujarati Food
The traditional Gujarati food is primarily vegetarian and has a high nutritional value. The typical Gujarati thali consists of varied kinds of lip smacking dishes. Gujarati cuisine has so much to offer and each dish has an absolutely different cooking style.
Kashmiri Food
Kashmiri food that we have today in the restaurants has evolved over the years. Highly influenced by the traditional food of the Kashmiri pundits, it has now taken some of the features of the cooking style adopted in Central Asia, Persia and Afghanistan.
Mughlai Cuisine
Mughlai cuisine is one of the most popular cuisines, whose origin can be traced back to the times of Mughal Empire. Mughlai cuisine consists of the dishes that were prepared in the kitchens of the royal Mughal Emperors. Indian cuisine is predominantly influenced by the cooking style practiced during the Mughal era.
Punjabi Food
The cuisine of Punjab has an enormous variety of mouth-watering vegetarian as well as non vegetarian dishes. The spice content ranges from minimal to pleasant to high. Punjabi food is usually relished by people of all communities. In Punjab, home cooking differs from the restaurant cooking style.
Rajasthani Food
The cuisine of Rajasthan is primarily vegetarian and offers a fabulous variety of mouthwatering dishes. The spice content is quite high in comparison to other Indian cuisines, but the food is absolutely scrumptious. Rajasthanis use ghee for cooking most of the dishes. Rajasthani food is well known for its spicy curries and delicious sweets.
South Indian Cuisine
The cuisine of South India is known for its light, low calorie appetizing dishes. The traditional food of South India is mainly rice based. The cuisine is famous for its wonderful mixing of rice and lentils to prepare yummy lip smacking dosas, vadas, idlis and uttapams.
The subcontinent of India is probably among the world’s most preserved ancient civilizations. Its rich culture is considered by a lot of historians as the world’s oldest living civilization dating back to 8000 BC. Its vast historical culture is very much evident in its people’s customs and traditions, religions, values and beliefs, arts, languages and ways of life. Its well-preserved ancient architecture and rich cuisine show reflections of the country’s diverse subcultures which are continually becoming popular all over the world.
Because of globalization and international migration, more and more Indians are moving outside of their native India. The Indian cuisine is also becoming among the most widely patronized traditional cuisines outside of its native country. This diaspora in other places around the world also started paving way for Indian cuisine to become more popular in other continents. Curry, which is among its widely spread traditional culinary staples, is also now becoming part of other fusion cuisines available in different cities and countries like Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Southeast Asia, China and the Middle East.
The history and diversity of Indian food can be traced back in 6000 BC. Indian food was greatly influenced by the different subcultures that once previously interacted within the country. The Aryans are considered among the pioneers in the formulation of the cuisine having arrived in India during that time. The British, Portuguese, Mughals and Turks are also being credited for taking part in influencing the Indian cuisine’s later formation. With its variety of inspirations and influences the cuisine was shaped to the culinary tradition that it has become now. Though perceived as somewhat homogenous in nature outside of its homeland, the traditional Indian cuisine is very much diverse and varied with its different regional and religion-derived culinary practices. It is subdivided into four different regional style of Indian food cooking mainly the North, South, East and West.
Usual Ingredients Used For Indian food Dishes
The Middle Ages, which was around the Gupta Dynasty, also played a big part in the formation of Indian food. Traders, travellers and new settlers introduced a lot of new products and cooking methods in the
Indian woman buying spices
region. Spices and tea became some of the new addition in the existing culinary valuables. The Northern part of the India became influenced by the Central part of the Asian continent, mainly Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Persia, giving rise to the fusion cooking of Mughlai cuisine. Among the most notable contribution of this fusion cuisine is the addition of several seasonings like saffron and the inclusion of new cooking practices like the use of sealed pots called dum.
Since Indian cuisine uses a large variety of ingredients you will be baffled and overwhelmed once you try going to their neighborhood markets. Among their common staple indian food items are rice, bajira or pearl millet, atta and wheat flour. The cuisine also uses a wide variety of legumes or pulses such as mung bean commonly known as moong, chickpeas or channa, red lentils or masoor, pigeon pea or toor and black gram or urad. Some of these are often processed to become besan or flour like moong and channa. These are also often consumed either as whole, split or dal and dehusked or dhuli. Split pulses are being consumed by the majority of the population in significant amounts.
Cooking oils such as vegetable oils are also widely used in Indian food dishes. In eastern India mustard oil is very predominant in their regional cooking. Peanut oil on the other hand is very popular in western and northern part of the country. Sesame oil or gingelly is widely used in the southern part. In the western part of the country, oil derived from coconut is also widely used. The Indian state of Kerala on the Malabar coast uses this predominantly. Nowadays other oils have also become major necessities in Indian cooking such as Vanaspati ghee or hydrogenated vegetable oil, soybean oil, sunflower oil and butter-based oil also known as desi ghee.
Spices also play a big part in their everyday cooking of Indian food. When Portugal colonized India in the sixteenth century it introduced the use of chilli peppers. Leaves and roots of the curry tree are also among the most widely used form of spice in the traditional Indian cooking. It is mainly used in the western state Gujarat. Aside from these, Indian cooking also largely use other spices such as turmeric or haldi, cumin or jeera, garlic or lehsun, black mustard seed or sarso, red chilly powder or mich, cardamom or elaichi, ginger or adrak, asafoetida or hing and coriander also known as dhania. Indian cooking also uses spice mix. These are combination of at least five different ingredients to create a distinct powder mix also known garam masala which is widely used in Indian food. Some of the most commonly used ingredients in this are cinnamon, cardamom and clover. Another popular spice mix is the much sweeter counterpart from the state of Maharashtra called goda masala. Spice mixes may differ from region to region and chefs can also experiment in creating their own. Aside from spices, Indian cooking also uses different herbs such as mint leaves, fenugreek, bay leaves or tejpat and coriander. Sweet dishes on the other hand may be flavored with saffron, cardamom, rose petal essences and nutmeg.

Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
Indian Cultural Food
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