There are two types of food in India, veg and non-veg. Wherever you go, on trains, in restaurants and homes, you will be asked if you are veg or non-veg - or else the food will be veg anyway so as not to offend. Even packaged food is supposed to be labelled with a green or brown dot to indicate whether it is veg or non-veg.
''Veg'' refers to food that contains no meat or eggs although it may include dairy products. ''Non-veg'' food contains fish, meat or eggs. The meat is mostly chicken or goat; rarely pork (it's forbidden to Muslims) or beef (cows are sacred to the Hindu majority).
Nevertheless, cows roam many of the cities, and along with pigs, dogs, crows and sometimes goats, forage in rubbish dumped on the sides of roads and down banks. They eat almost anything, cardboard, paper, even the odd plastic bag, as well as any green or food waste.
Somewhere between 30% and 40% of Indians are said to be vegetarian, more than in any other country, so it's no surprise that veg restaurants abound. The hotel manager where we stayed in Varanasi explained that most people in the old city were veg because of the Shiva temple there, one of the holiest in India, but they served eggs in the hotel restaurant because tourists often wanted them for breakfast.
Needless to say, there's a great variety of Indian vegetarian food. There are not only vegetable, lentil, chickpea or other bean dishes, but also kofta made from a variety of flours, and cheese cooked in delicious spicy gravies, sometimes almost too rich with cream and butter.
Cream and butter or ghee appear in many dishes or slathered on flatbread, and many things are deep-fried so it's not a particularly healthy cuisine, despite the many vegetables, legumes and grains.
While in Chandigarh for my niece's wedding, we had the opportunity to see several home kitchens from modest to quite grand ones. They have no ovens and cook on two or three-ring gas hobs that stand on the bench, although one of the larger kitchens also had an electric tandoor, shaped rather like a small filing cabinet, in which they cooked pizza for us.
Rice and lentils are cooked quickly in old-fashioned, hissy pressure cookers, which can be bought cheaply in the markets.
I didn't see any dishwashers, even in the posher kitchens, because most people, however modest, have a servant who cleans and sometimes helps cook.
As Summy Kapoor, of Varanasi, who showed us how to cook some everyday veg dishes, says, there's always someone poorer than you who needs a job.
Summy's saag paneer (cheese in spinach sauce)
Ingredients
1 bunch spinach or other greens
A thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled and sliced roughly
10-12 cloves garlic, peeled (or to taste)
2-3 small onions, peeled and chopped
safflower or other oil for frying
200g-250g paneer (Summy uses buffalo paneer, which she says holds its shape better)
½ tsp cumin seeds
salt to taste
½ tsp chilli powder or to taste
½ tsp black pepper
½ tsp sugar
25g butter
Method
Paneer is a fresh, pressed cheese available in supermarkets, or you could use an unsalted feta or even haloumi - or google a recipe for making your own.
Summy says you can vary the flavours by adding ground cashew nuts, coconut powder or fresh coconut in the gravy if you like.
Remove the large stems from the greens, wash and wilt in a little water in a covered saucepan.
Put the ginger, garlic and onions in a small blender with a little water and whizz to a paste. Remove paste from the blender and set aside. Puree the wilted greens in the blender (no need to wash it after the onion paste).
Cut the paneer into 2cm cubes. Heat a little oil in a frying pan and cook the paneer cubes until golden. If they are too dark they will be hard. Remove from pan and set aside.
Return the pan to the heat and add the cumin seed, then the ginger-garlic-onion paste. It will splutter and steam but stir it vigorously.
When it settles, add salt, chilli powder, pepper, sugar and the pureed spinach. Rinse the blender with a little water and add that. Allow to cook until soft and the raw taste has gone.
Stir in the cheese cubes and the butter - butter is essential, Summy says.
Bring to a simmer then cover the pan, turn off the heat and leave butter to melt.
Vegetable curry
Peas sold in India are mature and starchy and have to be podded, unlike the sweet frozen baby peas we have here. However, frozen peas work well.
Ingredients
2-3 potatoes, cut into 1.5cm chunks
¼-½ cauliflower cut into florets
1-1½ cups peas
2 Tbsp mustard oil - this gives a characteristic flavour, but any oil will do
A thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled and sliced
1 tsp cumin seed
1 tsp turmeric
½-1 tsp chilli powder or to taste
salt
2 tsp ground coriander
1-2 tsp garam masala
1 tomato, chopped
Fresh coriander
Method
Heat the oil in a large pan and stir in the sliced ginger and cumin seed. Allow to sizzle until fragrant, then add turmeric, chilli powder, coriander and salt to taste. Stir and allow to cook for a minute or two. Add the vegetables and a little water, stir, cover and leave to cook until the vegetables have softened (if you are using frozen instead of mature fresh peas, add them later as they cook quickly).
Stir in garam masala to taste, the chopped tomato and coriander leaves. You can cover this and leave it until the rest of the meal is ready, then decorate with more fresh coriander. If you want a wetter dish with more gravy, add more water at the cooking stage.
Summy says the touch of magic in this dish is her garam masala. She wouldn't give an exact recipe but says it has about equal parts of cloves, green and brown cardamom, black pepper, more of roasted cumin, a couple of sticks of cinnamon and a little nutmeg and mace. These are all ground then mixed to make the garam masala. It will keep in an airtight container.
Chapati (roti)
Makes 6-8 rotis, enough for two or three people
Atta flour, a finely stoneground wholewheat flour, is used and is available here in specialist stores. I used a mix of wholemeal and white.
Ingredients
2 cups flour
about ¼ cup water
Method
Mix the flour and cool or slightly warm water to make a soft but not wet dough. Leave it to rest for a few minutes.
Heat a heavy-bottomed, flattish pan or skillet.
Break off egg-sized pieces of dough and roll them out thinly.
Cook for to 1 minute on each side on the hot pan until brown spots appear and the bread puffs in places. Move the pan and use tongs to hold the roti briefly over the naked flame on each side so it puffs up.
Summy spreads the rotis generously with butter, but they are also delicious plain, especially when hot. Wrap in a clean tea towel and cover so they keep soft, but they really are most delicious eaten straight from the pan.
