The Food

South Indian food mainly contain rice, lentils and semolina based dishes. Fish features strongly in non vegetarian food and coconut, mustard seeds, curry leaves and red chillies are widely used as flavorings.

Adai: fermented rice and lentil pancakes

Avial: Amixed vegetable curry from kerala with a coconut and yoghurt sauce. Literally a amixture in malayalam

Biriyani: a more creative version of rice and curries . It is a meal in itself, and is very often served in marriages feasts.

Bonda: Spiced mashed potatoes dipped in chickpea-batter and deep fried.

Dosai or Dosa: thin, shallow fried pancake, often sculpted into interesting shapes ;very thin once called paper dosa. Most of them are made with fermented rice and lentil batter , but in rava dosai, cream of wheat semolina is used.

Masala dosai: dosa comes with a spicy masal filling here. All veg dishes are served with a sambar and chammanthy or chutney

Gobi: Cauliflower marinated in spices , then dipped in chick pea flor batter and deep fried. It is usually lurid pink due to the addition of food colourings

Idli: steamed sponges of ground rice and lentil battre. Eaten with sambar and coconut chutney.

Kadala: Black chick peas curry

Kalan: A thin curry from the southern states made from yoghurt , coconut and mangoes.

Kappa: casava root traditionaly prepared with coconut and chilly served with kadala

Kootu: mild vegetable curry in acreamy coconut and yoghurtt sauce.

Molee: A mouth watering kerala fiish curry with coconut milk.

Rasam: consomme made with lentils; it tasteds both pepper hot and tamarind sour

Thoran: vegetables stir fried with mustard seeds, curry leaves , chillies and fresh coconut grated.

Uppuma: A popular breakfast dish in which onions, spices and , occasionally , vegetables are cooked with semolina using a risotto like technique

Courtesy: time out Eating and Drinking guide 2008