Waste nothing!

A Bengali winter pithe

A chocolate cake for the ages

VIinho de alhos to vindaloo

An old fashioned pudding, with tea-custard sauce

Eaten all over India, this version is unique to Bengal

A strong coffee

Ilish—deep-fried

Three styles of cabbage fritters

Hilsa fish steamed in mustard sauce

Crunchy fried chicken in a hot-sour sauce

A creamy, delicate, small potol curry

Creamy, mildly sweet, set rice pudding

A distinctive biryani full of flavour but low on spiciness and heat.

A fragrant blend of three simple spices

A spice mix fit for kings!

A dry roasted Bengali spice blend

A thin, delicate crêpe filled with sweetened, reduced milk or kheer

Rice and crunchy veggies with a bengali twist

A Tibetan steamed bread

Slow-cooked, rich, bengali mutton curry

Hot and spicy, decadent and comforting

Calcutta’s most popular and iconic street food

Deep-fried, puffy bread stuffed with a spiced green-peas-and-hing filling

A sweet, milky, aromatic concoction steeped with orange pekoe tea

A pan-fried flatbread stuffed with a filling of mashed potatoes

The Bengali variant of ‘khichdi’ made with roasted moong dal and fragrant gobindobhog rice

A bright yellow, sweet Bengali polao redolent with ghee and garnished with fried cashews and raisins.

Bengali-style juicy curried new baby potatoes cooked in a savoury, tangy sauce and sprinkled with green peas.

Sweet and slightly tart, the tomato-khejur’er chutney popular at wedding feasts, is easy to make and cooks in under 15 minutes.

Subtle but rich in flavour, chingri malaikari—giant tiger/freshwater prawns cooked in creamy coconut-milk curry—is a Bengali treat.

Video recipe for traditional Bengali masoor dal tempered with nigella seeds and coriander. Takes 30 minutes to cook and tastes hearty.

A good nolen gur’er payesh (Bengali rice pudding) is one with a rich, creamy, silky texture and just the right amount of sweetness.

A chilled sweet, savoury and sour watery chutney made from small green mangoes with an added kick of pungent mustard oil.

The most most flamboyant sibling of the mashed potato family, aloo bhorta is the easiest and tastiest thing to make with potato.

The naughtier Indian cousin of the mashed potato-flavoured with ghee or mustard oil and green chllies-a tribute to Bengali love for aloo

These light and airy egg sandwiches à la Calcutta Coffee House make the perfect snack to accompany an evening cup of tea or coffee.

A traditional Bengali dish of Prawns or shrimps steamed in a sharp mustard and yoghurt sauce. Takes just 5 minutes to cook in microwave!

Kumro-chingri’r dalna is a warm, mellow, hearty Bengali-style prawn curry with some nutritious pumpkin thrown in for good measure.

This crispy, tangy, savoury 'chaat' is a popular Calcutta street food dished out by phuchkawalas and is super easy to make.

Ultimate Mughlai delicacy of thin slices of lean beef marinated in a nutty rich marinade and slow cooked in fat

Begun or baingan bhaja is a Bengali vegetarian recipe of shallow-fried eggplant disks. Crunchy outside, soft inside. Cooks in 15 minutes!

Elegant saffron laden rice koftas—a 100 year old snack from Tagore's niece, Pragyasundari Debi's cookbook.

A gorgeous-looking traditional Bengali vegetarian dal with roasted yellow mung beans, simmered with cauliflowers, carrots and peas.

The classic Calcutta fruitcake—a fixture in many homes around Christmas-time—is a rum-soaked, fruit-and-nut encrusted indulgence.

Juicy pork slices with hot chillies in every bite, chilli pork can double as a side dish as well as a standalone snack.

The ultimate Bengali egg curry made with duck eggs-boiled, fried golden, then cooked in onion-garlic-ginger-tomato-garam masala sauce.

Ema datshi, the national dish of Bhutan, is an easy-to-make, hearty soup with chilli peppers (‘ema’) and cheese (‘datshi’).

Spicy, curried snack made with yellow peas

A hearty Bengali Ilish (Hilsa) curry that takes just six ingredients and 30 minutes to cook.

This recipe for hilsa in mustard sauce, steamed in banana-leaf parcels, involves only nine ingredients and is very easy to make.

Ridged-gourd stewed in a mild sauce with coconut, green chillies and nigella seeds.

A step-by-step recipe that walks you through the process of making the perfectly fine, crisp, golden potato fries every single time.

A quick and delicate dal tempered with radhuni, a type of seed that is quite unique to Bengal.

Pan-fried chicken winglets