u/canadian_blueberry

Currently in the process of getting my green card, but I spend about half the year in NH and travel around to neighbouring states a lot.

New England feels like what I think a lot of people assume Canada is like. In some ways I wish we were more like New England. Everyone I've met has been so welcoming and kind, but not overbearing or fake. The mountains are so unbelievably gorgeous, and I love how old fashioned a lot of things are. It feels so peaceful and cosy, so real.

I just want you guys to know that this is what a lot of people around the world dream of. I've never been happier than when I'm here.

I made a bunch of gilded walnuts with gold foil and I absolutely loved how they came out. But I used a kit that had 100 sheets of foil and I only used like 15. So now I have a bunch of gold foil that I'm not sure what to do with!

Any and all suggestions welcome. Thanks

I'm Canadian but Indian food is my absolute favourite, and I'm trying to get better at Indian homestyle cooking. I've cooked mostly Southern dishes tbh (Kerala, Tamil Nadu) but I've experimented with different regions a little bit.

However, I had an idea that seemed very fun, which is to cook a meal from each state! I tried to find dishes that would be cooked in a typical home from that state, not necessarily restaurant or street foods (although maybe that's the next challenge? 🫣)

This is the list I have so far, but please let me know if I should replace or change anything. I'm not Indian so I may have made mistakes with which things are typical to eat at home, so please correct me if I was wrong about something.

Also, if you have a really good family recipe for one of the dishes on here, please share it! Thanks so much

**The states & dishes:**

Andhra Pradesh: Steamed rice, tomato pappu, gutti vankaya kura, gongura pachadi

Arunachal Pradesh: Chicken or vegetable thukpa, momos, simple leafy vegetable?

Assam: Rice, masor tenga, aloo pitika, khar

Bihar: Litti, chokha, dal, green chutney

Chhattisgarh: Fara, chila, seasonal vegetable/chutney?

Goa: Goan fish curry, steamed rice, vegetable bhaji

Gujarat: Gujarati dal, shaak, rotli, rice

Haryana: Bajra roti, mixed dal, sabzi, chaach

Himachal Pradesh: Rajma, rice, khatta, siddu

Jharkhand: Dhuska, ghugni, chutney

Karnataka: Bisi bele bath, kosambari, curd rice

Kerala: Rice, avial, thoran, Kerala fish curry

Madhya Pradesh: Dal, roti/bafla, bhutte ka kees

Maharashtra: Bhakri, pithla, bharli vangi

Manipur: Eromba, kangshoi/chamthong, rice

Meghalaya: Jadoh, tungrymbai, vegetable/fermented accompaniment?

Mizoram: Bai, sawhchiar, rice

Nagaland: Smoked pork, bamboo shoot, axone, rice

Odisha: Dalma, rice, saga bhaja, vegetable/fish?

Punjab: Dal, roti, seasonal sabzi, dahi

Rajasthan: Dal baati, ker sangri, garlic chutney

Sikkim: Momos, thukpa, gundruk

Tamil Nadu: Rasam, rice, sambar, poriyal, curd

Telangana: Rice, pappu, vegetable kura, pachadi

Tripura: Chakhwi, gudok, rice, mosdeng

Uttar Pradesh: Dal, roti, aloo/tori sabzi, raita

Uttarakhand: Kafuli, aloo ke gutke, mandua roti, bhatt ki dal

West Bengal: Rice, dal, aloo posto, macher jhol or shorshe machh

I'm Canadian but Indian food is my absolute favourite, and I'm trying to get better at Indian homestyle cooking. I've cooked mostly Southern dishes tbh (Kerala, Tamil Nadu) but I've experimented with different regions a little bit.

However, I had an idea that seemed very fun, which is to cook a meal from each state! I tried to find dishes that would be cooked in a typical home from that state, not necessarily restaurant or street foods (although maybe that's the next challenge? 🫣)

This is the list I have so far, but please let me know if I should replace or change anything. I'm not Indian so I may have made mistakes with which things are typical to eat at home, so please correct me if I was wrong about something.

Also, if you have a really good family recipe for one of the dishes on here, please share it! Thanks so much

The states & dishes:

Andhra Pradesh: Steamed rice, tomato pappu, gutti vankaya kura, gongura pachadi

Arunachal Pradesh: Chicken or vegetable thukpa, momos, simple leafy vegetable?

Assam: Rice, masor tenga, aloo pitika, khar

Bihar: Litti, chokha, dal, green chutney

Chhattisgarh: Fara, chila, seasonal vegetable/chutney?

Goa: Goan fish curry, steamed rice, vegetable bhaji

Gujarat: Gujarati dal, shaak, rotli, rice

Haryana: Bajra roti, mixed dal, sabzi, chaach

Himachal Pradesh: Rajma, rice, khatta, siddu

Jharkhand: Dhuska, ghugni, chutney

Karnataka: Bisi bele bath, kosambari, curd rice

Kerala: Rice, avial, thoran, Kerala fish curry

Madhya Pradesh: Dal, roti/bafla, bhutte ka kees

Maharashtra: Bhakri, pithla, bharli vangi

Manipur: Eromba, kangshoi/chamthong, rice

Meghalaya: Jadoh, tungrymbai, vegetable/fermented accompaniment?

Mizoram: Bai, sawhchiar, rice

Nagaland: Smoked pork, bamboo shoot, axone, rice

Odisha: Dalma, rice, saga bhaja, vegetable/fish?

Punjab: Dal, roti, seasonal sabzi, dahi

Rajasthan: Dal baati, ker sangri, garlic chutney

Sikkim: Momos, thukpa, gundruk

Tamil Nadu: Rasam, rice, sambar, poriyal, curd

Telangana: Rice, pappu, vegetable kura, pachadi

Tripura: Chakhwi, gudok, rice, mosdeng

Uttar Pradesh: Dal, roti, aloo/tori sabzi, raita

Uttarakhand: Kafuli, aloo ke gutke, mandua roti, bhatt ki dal

West Bengal: Rice, dal, aloo posto, macher jhol or shorshe machh

I'm 21F, Canadian, and white. I have a huge fixation on India and everything related to it. When I was little, sometimes my mom and I would watch Bollywood movies in her little apartment because they were free, and I grew up thinking of India as this amazing and exotic place that I always dreamed of going to.

Then when I was in college, I met an amazing girl who quickly became my best friend. She is from Kolkata and was more than happy to tell me about her culture. She showed me pictures and told me about the festivals, and when she went home to visit she brought back so many gifts of spices, tea, jewelry, and a beautiful silk kurti with traditional Bengali embroidery. We celebrated Diwali together and her housemates shared their regional dishes as well, it was amazing.

Then I had to move away after college. We're still good friends but it's not the same. However, I was still super interested in India and decided I wanted to learn how to cook some things. I learned so many home style dishes from many different parts of the country and I feel like I've gotten pretty good. Then my curiosity got wider and I started to look into Indian history, geography, and culture more. Now I feel like I spend almost all of my free time invested in it... I'm always watching videos about it, cooking Indian dishes every week, reading about it, looking around on Google maps, and working on a multi week trip itinerary I hope to take next year. I'm planning to start learning Hindi soon as well. I even briefly considered moving there when there was a good paying au pair position available, but decided against it for a couple reasons.

I mentioned a couple of these things to a (white) friend I hadn't seen in a while, and they said it was kind of weird and that it might be cultural appropriation to be doing this stuff, and now I'm worried they're right and that I've been disrespectful? I didn't know how to respond at the time and I've been feeling awkward ever since

For further context, my family is British and my great grandfather actually worked for the East India company as a mining supervisor, just outside Kolkata, which is obviously problematic and something I'm ashamed of. I don't want to come across as fetishizing the country or something...*I know that it's not the perfect exotic place I thought of it as when I was a child, and I know that it has real and serious issues that should be addressed.* It's also a real issue how British people have historically (and presently) fetishized India and I really do not want to be a part of that.

AITAH? Is my friend right? Am I being an insensitive white person trying to worm my way into a culture that my ancestors actively harmed? I really don't know and I need some perspective