The missing ingredient

Just like the Uttar Pradesh government's One District, One Cuisine list, the state's diverse culinary traditions find little space in its food conversations

- BY SHUBHANGI SHAH

The first bite melts almost instantly. That’s Lucknow’s galawati kebab—refined, aromatic and flavourful, carrying the finesse of Awadh's royal kitchens where it is believed to have first been prepared for an 18th-century nawab who had lost his teeth.

Several kilometres away in eastern Uttar Pradesh, mutton takes on a more rustic character, cooked frugally in mustard oil and onions.

In winter, green peas become nimona, a simple vegetarian staple, while tehri, a humble one-pot rice dish, remains comfort food through every season. In Braj, meanwhile, Krishna mythology continues to shape the table, just as Afghan influences intertwined with Awadhi and Mughal culinary traditions continue to define Rampur's.

If you search online for an Uttar Pradesh restaurant, chances are the results will lead you to Awadhi cuisine: a delicious spread of kebabs and pulaos, qormas and sheermal and, of course, shahi tukda. It captures the culinary essence of one region beautifully, but not of an entire state that stretches from the Terai to the dry plains of Bundelkhand, bordered by Bihar and Delhi, with Nepal to the north and rivers like the Ganga and the Yamuna running through it.

Uttar Pradesh is also the land of Krishna mythology and nawabs, of Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb, caste and migration. That complexity isn’t fully reflected either in the extensive list of dishes the state government released earlier this month.

Featuring 208 dishes, the Uttar Pradesh government's One District, One Cuisine (ODOC) scheme aims to promote traditional food through branding, packaging and marketing. According to reports, selected dishes will receive subsidies and support to reach wider markets. All the dishes on the list are vegetarian. So Lucknow gets rewari and mango produce, Rampur gets hapsi halwa and Azamgarh gets tehri, even as some of the state’s most enduring meat traditions remain absent.