Food & Markets

Start at six, because the market does. Mysore’s Devaraja is jasmine and banana leaf by half past; Old Delhi’s Matia Mahal is paya and warm sheermal before the shops shift to kebabs at dusk. The subcontinent’s regional cooking rewards specificity: galouti in Lucknow that needs no teeth, Amritsar’s kulcha weighted with butter, a Chettiar house in Karaikudi where the pepper chicken is dry-fried in a courtyard, a Kerala toddy shop serving karimeen in banana leaf. Colombo brings hoppers and pol sambol; Kathmandu, Newari samay baji. We cook with families rather than schools, book the table that has four seats, and time markets to the hour they actually trade.