Tamil Nadu provides the visitor with a wide variety of delicious food both for the vegetarians as well as the non-vegetarians, though most food in Tamil Nadu consists of grains, lentils, rice and vegetables. Spices are added to give a distinctive taste.
Breakfast or tiffin includes idli or steamed rice dumplings, dosai is a crisp pancake made from a batter of rice and lentils, vada is a deep fried doughnut made from a batter of lentils, pongal is a mixture of rice and lentils cooked together and seasoned with ghee, cashew nuts, pepper and cumin seed), uppuma is semolina cooked, seasoned in oil with mustard, pepper, cumin seed and dry lentils.
Lunch usually consists of rice with Sambar, rasam, and yogurt along with a number of spicy side dishes. This is called meals. A decent meals costs less than a dollar.
There are 2 types of meals Limited and Unlimited.
There are several variations of the dishes mentioned above which are eaten with coconut chutney, sambar which is a seasoned lentil dish and mulaga podi which is a powdered mix of several roasted lentils and red chilli blended with oil.
Meat Madras- This is a spicy but delicious curry is named after Chennai, the metropolis in southern India perhaps because in the humid south, people rather eat hot food. Strange though it may seem, this is because hot and spicy food makes one perspire thereby cooling the body.
Plain idlis- Plain Idlis are similar to rice cakes, but they are eaten with a coconut side dish made out of beaten coconut white mixed with a little spice. Its called Coconut (Thenga in Tamil) Chutney. Also typically served are Tomato chutney (the difference is here tomato pulp is used) and Dal sambar. The Idlis are served steaming hot. They are meant to be eaten with hand.
Kancheepuram idlis - Hot and spicy. These differ from the normal Idlis due to the extra ingredients added usually to make it a little more spicy.
Pal payasam (rice pudding) - This is a sweet dish made from rice and thick milk.
Dosai or dosa - This is Indias answer to the French Crepes, though the answer could arguably have been given much before the question was asked. It is made from rice flour. Rice flour is mixed with an optimum level of water. Finding the optimum level is an art which most of the Indian women are born with. As too much or too less can make your Dosa non-appetizing. Dosas again come in a variety of forms and sizes. A dosa with potato curry stuffed inside becomes a Masala Dosa. A Dosa made from Rice flour and Fine semolina (Rawa) becomes a Rawa Dosa. Like idlis, dosas are usually eaten with coconut chutney, tomato chutney and sambar.
Poori Masala(Poori Kizlaingu)- It's made in fine wheat flour, quite oily food. It served as break fast or evening tiff-en with potato curry.
Vadai- it's prepared with different lentils and fried in oil, which can be eat with or without chutney & sambar. It can be had with breakfast or evening snacks. Different types of vadai are prepared like, medu vadai(orid Dal), masala vadai(Toor Dal), etc.
Aapam
Ven Pongal
Lemon Rice
Tamarind Rice
Curd Rice
Rasam
Murukku
Adhirasam
Bajji
Vetral Kuzhambu
The Most Frequently Asked Travel Questions about Tamil Nadu
Where To Stay & Best Hotels in Tamil Nadu - updated May 2024
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Tamil Nadu Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.
