India contains a rich and diverse number of culinary traditions drawing upon local and introduced ingredients and a wide variety of regional specialties. On offer are an extraordinary number of ways to satisfy the appetite and excite the palate. For those who are travelling there, however, this fact seems largely academic. In travelling through India one is confronted with a standard menu of watery
alloo matter, greasy
pooris, overcooked ommelettes, gritty
paneer and occosianally an
idli that would make Rajneesh from the Indian take-away at home fire his cook. And on every menu in the places tourists get directed to when they say they want food, whether at one of those strange
diner places in the
Punjab, a roadside stop in
Rajasthan or a train station in
Uttar Pradesh, there is a strange item known to one and all as the Vegetable Cutlet.
The only thing really consistent about the VC aside from the name is the
chilli factor. The VC tastes bland after even a few days of subcontinental cuisine. Mostly. Every so often you will bite into a whole chilli that was kindly left there for you. You will then flush, cry, kick your friend/partner, look vainly for a
raita or
lassi, swear, sweat and then quietly continue your meal as life fades into the more general background insanity more generally familiar to seasoned
trippers. Other than that there is no real consistency of manufacture. They are not a type of fake meat, despite the name, and can be crumbed and cooked in lots of
ghee.
They often contain potato but sometimes make do with onion and tomatoes.
They often contain dirt but sometimes make do with somebody's hair.
In the few instances it's possible to do so, it's best to drink plenty of
beer to make these bearable. Thankfully, Indian Restaurants in
Australia are more content serving
Rogan Josh.
rischi was cool enough to mention that these are called "tikki" in common
hindi. No worries sunshine.