BellaOnline Forums Food and Wine Indian Food What is your all-time favorite Indian dish & why??

This is a real toughie for me because there are so many wonderful Indian dishes -- some I enjoy for the taste but others are just attached to lovely memories :-)

So I would like to know:

What is your favorite Indian dish (pick 1 only please!)?
Why?
Have you tried making it yourself?

I'm thinking about this one myself & will post my answer soon!

Really....only ONE? I'd have to say my favorite is Dal Makhani with some naan. Why it's my favorite, I really don't know. I like the spiciness. It makes a hearty, satisfying meal!

Hi Lyn, what a great choice! I too, LOVE Dal Makhani :-) Have you tried making it at home? Here's my recipe:

Dal Makhani

I've got a recipe for Cashew Curry that I use again and again. It's very versatile so I've used it as a vegetarian dish with eggplant or sweet potatoes and I've also made it with chicken. It's always good.

Why do I like it so much, besides its versatility? I used to be the chef at a research branch of a cancer center (interesting that that center's ad is at the left side of my screen right now; I've never seen it here at BellaOnline). It was a rather small facility and one of my duties was to make and serve lunch to the staff every day.

When I took on the job, I got lots of requests to cook something 'different' from the Central Texas / Tex Mex foods that had been typical before my arrival. I noticed the many ethnicities represented by the administrative and research staff at the center and started cooking things I thought a broader audience might like.

Every time I branched out into a different ethnic cuisine, it was always with the fear of being compared to how grandma made it and I knew there's no way to beat such fierce competition. I always accepted the fact that the people who knew the particular cuisine the best would know it wasn't 'authentic' but I hoped they'd accepted my Americanized version anyway.

Example? One day I made Chinese food and a researcher from China translated her mother's recipe for Kung Pao Chicken and gave it to me to use at the center. It became one of my biggest sellers and is one of my recipes I treasure most.

There was a small group of researchers from India who came to lunch most days and I wanted to cook for them. I'd had this Cashew Curry recipe for a while and thought I give it a try. I made a vegetarian / eggplant version and a chicken version.

The Indians who came to lunch regularly expressed pleasure in my efforts and bought my curry for their lunches. A little while later, new Indian faces appeared in the lunch line, people I'd never seen before but who were coworkers who usually brought their own lunches. In a few minutes, a few more Indians showed up and then a few more, until the lunch period brought a whole new group of people I'd never seen before. I had no idea there were that many people from India working at the research center. Apparently, the curry was a hit and word of it was spreading throughout the center's Indian population. What a relief on my part!

I didn't see too much of those "new" Indians in the lunch line on a regular basis but I quickly learned to prepare for extra sales when the curry recipe was on the menu because it always brought them back to my kitchen for lunch. The curry gave me a chance to reconnect with my Indian coworkers I only saw when Cashew Curry was on the menu. Good food brings good company and that's one of my favorite things about cooking!

Hi Sadhana,

If I ever were to visit the U.S. again, I would head to Sunnyvale, CA and at our favorite Indian resaurant there I would order Panak Paneer because I relish the combination of the slightly acidic spinach with the mellowness of the freshly made cheese. Of course, I would just have to top it off with some (ok lots) of mango chutney to give it a sweet/sour complexity and maybe even make a "taco" out of it with some naan.

Awesome....THANK YOU! I have never tried making it. Usually, I buy it in a foil pouch at the grocery store.

A few years ago, we lived in an apartment under an Indian couple. Our apartment always smelled of curry. I loved it. I used to joke that I was going to start taking showing up at their door with a plate every night. I had always hoped she'd teach me to make a few dishes, because it never seems to taste the same when I make it.

@Sandy: I love cashew curry (part of my Goan ancestry!), sounds delicious. Cooking should be adaptable & flexible :-) I myself like to travel off the beaten culinary path & think outside the box (while my more elder traditional family members roll their eyes but still enjoy eating what I made at the same time). Mix it up! Indian food can be intimidating so I really appreciate when non-Indians make Indian food at home, that's awesome!

@Les: I love palak paneer too & I used to live in SJ for many years before moving to FL. Lots of great Indian restaurants in the Bay area. I often think of mole as a Mexican curry of sorts :-)

@Lyn: the foil packets of ready made food are convenient but are notorious for containing extremely high amounts of various preservatives & especially salt! It's healthier & tastier to make your own. Dal Makhani can also be made in a slow cooker as well :-) Indians are great hosts, you should have definitely shown up with a plate!

Oooh... this is a toughie! I super love all Indian food but my absolute fav would be Butter Chicken! OMG, butter chicken is so crazy good!! YUM!!

Oh yeah murgh makhani is delicious. For me my favorite would have to be a lamb rogan josh.. yum

How can we choose only one?

Palak Paneer.

I've made my own naan, samosas and aloo gobi but not palak paneer. Just saw your recipe for homemade paneeer and I am going to try it. I didn't realize that the cheese had to be cubed and fried.

Hello Lori,

Paneer doesn't need to be cubed or fried (but it tastes much better fried!). It is healthier not to fry it :-)

Hope this helps!

I have never tried Indian food but I heard that Indian foods are specie and tasty.

I can't remember the name of it, but it was a dish in the movie, "Along Came Polly."

She brought him dinner in a bag at his office and it was like maugugie, bogogie, or something...I know that's way off by name, but basically a vegetarian wrap, like cabbage w/a mixture of beef and rice enclosed.

I make a lot of low-carb wraps, but, "eh on the other hand, lol, I love empanadas as well"

I'll figure ot out, the name. I have the movie.

Karen, you're so funny..I wish you lived down the street!

was "Polly" Brad Pitts ex? GEEZ! I'm doing what you're doing! I'll remember her name! LOL

Hmm.... I saw that movie too but don't remember the Indian food wrap & the name doesn't really sound like anything Indian + the beef (which is not eaten in India).

Please do let me know when you find out, I am intrigued now!

Thanks :-)

I don't know why but I like to eat Indian foods more than any other country's food. If I talk about my favorite food, Punjabi and south Indian dishes would be great.

Spinach curry for me because I love the texture (like creamed spinach) and taste.

I love Saag Paneer. Like Susan, I love the texture and taste of the spinach, plus paneer makes almost anything taste special.

I have eaten almost all country's food but Indian food is quite different. I like to eat Punjabi and South Indian most.

So glad you enjoy it Kate, both North & South :-)

I saw this thread a while ago, but wanted to really think about what my favorite Indian dish might be before posting. Alas, I cannot choose one!

I was first introduced to Indian food about 15 years ago when I went to an Indian buffet in Denver with some colleagues. I ate so much it hurt! I love food with flavor and nothing compares to the flavors in Indian food.

Since that time I have tried Indian restaurants across the country...anytime I go anywhere I look for vineyards and Indian restaurants (weird, I know). I was doing some consulting work in Indiana a few years ago and one of the people I was working with happened to be Indian. I asked him if he could recommend a good Indian restaurant and he invited me to his home! His wife cooked a HUGE meal of several different dishes. I got to ask them a ton of questions about various spices and a lot about India. They even gave me some different spices to take home. It was a wonderful day!

I stopped consulting a short time after that and was working at a company that consulted with a large Indian company. I became friends with one of their consultants who came over to the US for training and he went with me to several book stores to hunt down a cookbook that had authentic Indian recipes. I use it all the time.

I have even befriended the owners and staff at my favorite Indian restaurant here in Colorado Springs. They have given my 6-year-old daughter and me tours of their kitchen, let us make naan in their big clay ovens and shared one of their recipes with me, which I have promised not to share. Even my daughter loves the food and she is unbelievably picky!

I've decided I can't pick one favorite. I love chutneys and pickles, curries and Naan. Everything has so much flavor, but the flavors are so different. I just love it all. I guess I'm obsessed!

I would have to say Samosas, Butter Chicken, Naan, Mango Lassi - that's my standard order at my local Indian restaurant. My husband always orders new dishes or the specials so I get to sample those too! I LOVE INDIAN FOOD!!!

I love shrimp with spices from Julie Sahni's classic cookbook. I have found that I can also substitute chicken breast. For a vegetarian dish, I sub in Quorn cutlets. This dish is known at our house as Yellow Chicken or Yellow Shrimp, since it is colored with turmeric. EVERYBODY loves this, even our kids who usually don't like Indian food.

Those bread pakoras look delish, but they look like a sometime treat, since they are fried!

We haven't had Indian food in quite a while due to the pandemic. We used to cook it a lot at home but fell out of the habit. Maybe it's time to start that up again! I adore palak paneer.