Punjabi Thaali

Punjab is a Northern state of India very rich in its cuisine.The food is rich in ghee and butter as Punjabi’s are robust people with robust appetites.By large their non veg food is very popular but nothing like their vegetarian cuisine which has endless variation.The hit list topping with Paneer variety then come in Raajma-chaawal,kadi chaawal..endless delicious food.The simple home cooking also tastes like restaurant food because of the use of ghee,butter and cream.They are basic wheat eaters as wheat is the main crop of Punjab.The popular parathas…aaloo,gobhi mooli..lavishly fried in ghee, served with dollops of home made butter and some fresh chunky bowl of curd are a few favorite of Amritsari people.Ofcourse we cannot miss the Amritsari chole,wadiya and papad.Infact if you guys ever get a chance to visit Amritsar you must visit The Bharwan da Dhabba.This is a old dhabba with finger licking food.The dhaaba culture is very popular in Punjab. In summer we see the Punjabi women carrying the chapati dough to the nearby tandoor.Here the tandoor wala makes these rotis with a nominal charge.Huge clay ovens , these tandoors are half buried in the ground and heated with coal fire lit below.These tandoors take me back when I was probably 6-7 years old.I still remember mom sending the dough to the closest tandoor,which I used to watch from my window.


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Punjabi cuisine is one of my favorite cuisines when it comes to Indian Cuisines. I think it’s the favorite for many, so that so that when Indian food is represented globally, you will mostly find Punjabi dishes getting the center spot. After popular demands to have Thali themes, I decided it will be best to repeat and so for this month’s BM#74 Edition. We have seen others dishing out elaborate thalis.
I decided to make a simple Punjabi Thali, keeping in mind that I started planning for this very late and weekends are the only days I can cook such elaborate meals. I have a North Indian Thali already, which combined a couple of dishes from neighboring states and I wasn’t sure which belonged to which state. Generally speaking, our cooking has become so global. We no longer stick to one particular cuisine in our everyday cooking. I mostly keep including dishes from different states and many times it might get morphed to your specific cooking style.

Punjabi thali, I included all the Punjabi dishes which is our family favorite. Punjabi cuisine has some exotic flavors which have some of the flavors shared from its neighbor Pakistan.Punjabi recipes are most famous, all over India and even in south Indian many restaurants serve Punjabi dishes. Punjabi dishes are loved universally for its richness and taste. I didn’t get much time to do photography as I had to wind up soon, so didn’t click separate pictures of each dish. Hope it is not too bad Coming to the menu for this thali – I kept it very simple.Made 1 starter and accompaniment, 2 variety curry, 1 dal dish and a sweet.

  • Paneer Tikka With Dahi Ki chutney
  • Phulkas
  • Aloo Paratha
  • Punjabi Chole
  • Dhaba Style Palak Paneer
  • Moongdal Makhni
  • Kada Prasad – same as whole wheat flour sheera.