The famous foods of Rajasthan

Rajasthan's signature combination: baked wheat-flour balls (baati) served with dal and a sweet, crumbled churma. It's the dish most travellers are told to try first, and it earns the reputation.

A fiery red mutton curry with roots in the Mewar hunting tradition, coloured and heated by generous Mathania chillies.

Gram-flour dumplings simmered in a yoghurt-based gravy — a vegetarian desert staple born of scarce fresh vegetables.

• Ker sangri — wild desert berries and beans, a dry preparation unique to the region.
• Bajre ki roti — millet flatbread, a staple where wheat was historically scarce.
• Pyaaz kachori — Jodhpur's onion-filled pastry, best eaten hot from a street stall.

• Mirchi bada — a large green chilli stuffed with spiced potato, dipped in gram-flour batter and fried; Jodhpur's best-known street snack.
• Bikaneri bhujia — crisp strands of moth-bean and gram-flour dough from Bikaner, now sold all over India.
• Chaas — thin, lightly spiced buttermilk, drunk with meals to cool down in the heat.
• Raab — a warm drink of pearl-millet flour cooked with buttermilk, a winter staple in village homes.

• Ghewar — a disc-shaped, syrup-soaked sweet closely associated with the Teej festival.
• Mawa kachori — a sweet, khoya-filled version of the savoury pastry.
• Feeni — fine vermicelli threads, often served with milk.
• Malpua — fried sweet pancakes soaked in syrup and often served with rabri; Pushkar is known for them.

• Haveli restaurants in Jaipur, Udaipur or Jodhpur for a proper thali.
• A local guide can point you to the family-run places that don't show up online — often better value than the tourist-facing options.