Traditional recipes

Hilsa steaks cooked in a sharp sauce of ground mustard seeds, green chillies and mustard oil, Bengal’s best-loved fish dish of the monsoon.

Large prawns simmered in a mild, sweetish coconut-milk gravy with whole spices and ghee, a dish for weddings and special lunches.

A light, thin curry of rohu or katla with potatoes and vegetables, flavoured with cumin, ginger and panch phoron, eaten with rice in Bengali homes every day.

Mutton slow-cooked with onions, ginger, garlic and spices and stirred until the dark, thick masala clings to the meat.

Rohu or katla cooked in a gently spiced curd gravy with a touch of sweetness, a dish of feasts and festive lunches.

Fillets of bhetki coated in mustard and coconut paste, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed or roasted on a tawa.

A rich, thick dish of rice cooked with the fried head of a large rohu or katla, potatoes, ghee and warm spices.

A lightly spiced, fragrant mutton biryani with soft potatoes and boiled eggs, cooked by the dum method.

Fried chicken tossed with garlic, green chillies, onion, capsicum and soy sauce, a signature dish of Kolkata’s Indian-Chinese cooking.

A flaky paratha fried with a layer of egg, rolled around sliced onion, green chilli, lime and sauces, Kolkata’s favourite street food.

A square, stuffed paratha filled with beaten egg, onion and green chilli, shallow-fried until crisp and served with potato curry and onion salad.

A mildly bitter and gently sweet mixed-vegetable stew with bitter gourd, raw banana, drumsticks and sweet potato in a milk and mustard base, served at the start of a Bengali meal.

Potato cubes cooked with ground white poppy seeds and green chillies, a simple, cooling dish especially loved in western Bengal.

Bengal gram dal cooked with coconut pieces, raisins and whole spices, slightly sweet, and served with luchi on festive mornings.

Soft, puffed deep-fried breads of refined flour, Bengal’s festive bread, eaten with dal, potato curry or sweets.

Soft, deep-fried breads stuffed with a spiced paste of fresh green peas, a Bengali winter breakfast.

Baby potatoes slow-cooked in a thick, mildly spiced tomato and ginger gravy, eaten with luchi and kochuri.

Thick slices of brinjal rubbed with turmeric and salt and fried in mustard oil until soft inside and golden outside.

Finely chopped banana flower cooked with potato, coconut and Bengal gram, a dry, gently sweet vegetarian dish that takes patience to prepare.

A mixed vegetable dish of pumpkin, potato, radish, brinjal and greens cooked with panch phoron, offered as bhog at Durga Puja and Saraswati Puja.

Fragrant Gobindobhog rice and roasted moong dal cooked with ghee, ginger and vegetables, the khichuri offered to the goddess at Durga Puja.

Soft fried pieces of fresh chhena (cottage cheese) and potatoes in a light ginger and tomato gravy, a vegetarian dish for festive and niramish days.

Diamond-shaped cakes of ground chana dal, steamed or fried and simmered in a ginger and cumin gravy, a classic of Bengali vegetarian cooking.

Young green jackfruit cooked with potatoes and warm spices in a thick gravy, so meaty in texture that it is called ‘gaachh-patha’, the goat that grows on a tree.

Red pumpkin and potato cooked with panch phoron and a hint of sweetness, eaten with luchi or rice.

Short-grain aromatic rice cooked in ghee with turmeric, whole spices, cashews and raisins, mildly sweet and served on festive days.

Cooked rice soaked overnight in water so it ferments lightly, eaten cool with salt, green chilli, onion, lime and fried or mashed sides.

Puffed rice tossed with mustard oil, onion, chilli, boiled potato, peanuts, chanachur and lime, sold in paper cones on Kolkata’s streets.

Dried yellow peas cooked soft with potato, ginger and spices, topped with onion, chilli, tamarind and bhaja moshla.

Spongy white balls of fresh chhena cooked in light sugar syrup. Banglar Rosogolla has a GI tag.

A soft sweet of fresh chhena cooked with nolen gur, the new date-palm jaggery of winter, and pressed into moulds.

Thick, caramel-coloured sweet curd set in earthen pots from reduced milk and sugar or jaggery.

Tiny golden pearls of fried rice-and-gram-flour batter soaked in sugar syrup, a GI-tagged sweet of Bardhaman.

Soft balls of fragrant kanakchur khoi (popped rice) bound with nolen gur and ghee, a GI-tagged winter sweet of Joynagar in South 24 Parganas.

Thin crêpes of rice flour, semolina and flour rolled around a filling of coconut and jaggery or kheer, made for Poush Sankranti.

Small round sweets of fresh coconut cooked with jaggery and cardamom, offered at Lakshmi Puja and shared on Bijoya Dashami.

Gobindobhog rice slow-cooked in milk and sweetened with nolen gur, the date-palm jaggery of winter.

A smoky, sweet-sour summer drink of raw mangoes roasted in embers, mixed with sugar, roasted cumin and black salt.

A sweet and tangy chutney of tomatoes, dates and dried mango leather (aamsotto), served near the end of a Bengali meal.

Light, fragrant black tea from the Darjeeling hills, brewed briefly and drunk without milk to keep its delicate flavour.