Eating my way through India

My Month-long Journey

The day I landed back in the US after a month in India, my Mom asked if I was craving some comfort food, like a bagel for breakfast or pasta with tomato sauce for dinner. I said “Hell no, that sounds so bland, all I want is Channa Masala!!!” Since then I’ve tried to make dosa, roti, and channa masala with the spices I brought home, but I can’t quite do it like they did in India. I’m also really craving okra as I write this… but anyways, I could NEVER get tired of Indian food. It is effortlessly vegetarian, wildly diverse, beyond delicious, and refreshingly inexpensive. The one challenge of navigating vegan ethical eating was avoiding ghee and cream.  

I basically ate out for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for an entire month (my past self in Boston would never have believed this could be affordable). My go-to dishes were Dal Tadka and Vegetable Bryani. These became my comfort foods for the month because they were widely available, generally not spicy, and always naturally vegan.

It was refreshing to travel through a country that respected meat-free diets, as about 40% of Indians don’t eat animals–the degrees and definitions of ‘veg’ differ widely between the various cultures throughout India’s regions. While I was there, I thought ‘thank god Indians don’t eat cows. I can’t imagine what another billion people eating beef would do to our planet.’ But I did note that dairy consumption seemed to beat an all time high, and plant-based alternatives to dairy were hard to come by.

I was impressed by how wildly available food was, food stalls lining the sides of almost every street and vendors walking around offering food to drivers in the midst of crazy Mumbai traffic jams. I will forever be appreciative of the kind hearts who shared their culture with me through rich and delicious cuisines.

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