A Taste of Madhya Pradesh: Food from India’s Wild Heart

Madhya Pradesh sits almost literally in the middle of India, which makes its food difficult to sum up neatly. Travel west toward Indore and you find the street-food traditions of Malwa. Head east toward Kanha and the cooking changes, shaped by forests, small farms and the food traditions of Gond and Baiga communities.

Our cycling route through Madhya Pradesh follows that second path, passing through agricultural valleys, forest corridors and villages where millet, lentils, seasonal vegetables and ingredients gathered from the surrounding countryside remain part of everyday cooking. The food can be simple, but that simplicity is part of what makes it interesting.

Kicad Roti: Bread Cooked Between Leaves

Roti appears on tables throughout India, but kicad roti is something quite different. The dough is made from wheat flour with salt and a little ghee or butter, then pressed between leaves and slowly roasted over charcoal or a traditional cooking fire.

When the leaves are peeled away, the bread has a firm, almost biscuit-like exterior with a subtle smoky flavor. It is one of the dishes associated with Gond cooking around Kanha and may be served with jaggery, dal or vegetable dishes. At Kanha Earth Lodge, one of the places we stay on our Madhya Pradesh tour, it can appear as part of a traditional Gond meal.

It is also a good reminder that “Indian bread” means considerably more than naan.

Paan Bada: Lentils With a Different Personality

Lentils are everywhere in India, but they do not always arrive as a bowl of dal. For paan bada, black urad dal is soaked, ground with seasonings, formed into small fritters and fried before being served with a spiced gravy.

The result is hearty and warming, particularly welcome after a day on the bike. Gond cooking makes extensive use of grains and pulses, ingredients well suited to rural communities where meals traditionally depended on what could be grown locally or gathered nearby.

Kodo and Kutki: Small Grains With a Long History

Long before millet started appearing on health-food shelves, communities in central India were eating it because it grew well here.

Kodo and kutki are small millets that remain important in Baiga cooking. They can be prepared somewhat like rice, ground for other dishes or used to make pej, a thin drink or porridge traditionally made from grain and water.

These are not elaborate restaurant creations. They are everyday foods tied directly to the landscape, climate and farming traditions of the region, which is precisely what makes them worth trying.

Bhedra Chutney: Don’t Underestimate the Condiments

One lesson you learn quickly while eating around India is that the little dish sitting beside the main meal can sometimes have the biggest personality.

Bhedra chutney, served as part of Gond meals around Kanha, combines roasted tomatoes with garlic, coriander, chilies and spices. Traditionally, the ingredients are worked together on a stone grinding slab rather than blitzed in a machine.

The chutney brings heat, acidity and freshness to earthy dishes of rice, lentils and bread. As with chilies everywhere in India, however, enthusiasm and tolerance are two entirely different things.

Mahua: A Forest Ingredient With Many Uses

The mahua tree has long been important to forest communities across central India. Its flowers can be eaten, dried, made into sweets and other foods, or fermented into a traditional alcoholic drink.

Among Baiga communities, mahua appears in several forms rather than as a single dish. It is a particularly good example of how closely food traditions here are connected to the surrounding forests. For visitors, mahua may be unfamiliar. For people who have lived in these landscapes for generations, it is simply part of the pantry.

And Then There Is the Rest of Madhya Pradesh

Travel farther west and the menu changes again.

Around Indore and the Malwa region, you are more likely to encounter bhutte ka kees, grated corn cooked with milk, ghee and spices; garadu, fried yam tossed with a sharp spice mixture; and dal bafla, wheat dough balls that are boiled, roasted and traditionally finished with plenty of ghee before being served with dal.

They belong to the same state, but to a different culinary landscape. That variety is one reason describing anything simply as “Indian food” does not tell you very much.

Food Along the Road

One of the pleasures of cycling in India is that food stops being something reserved for breakfast and dinner. There is chai in a village, fruit from a roadside market, samosas after a ride, vegetables being sold at a weekly market and meals prepared from ingredients grown only a short distance away.

On our Madhya Pradesh cycling tour, the forests and wildlife may initially be what bring people here. Tigers, leopards and sloth bears are difficult competition for dinner.

But somewhere between Pench and Kanha, food becomes another way of understanding the landscape.

And unlike the tiger, it usually stays around long enough for seconds.