Street Food: The Good The Bad and The Ugly

For us one of the joys of travel is fearlessly diving into the local street food scene. We read online guides and watch numerous foodie travel vlogs to pick up tips on where and what we should try. In India chats are a very popular roadside or food stall snack, usually consisting of a fried dough or stuffed samosa covered with lentil dal, or any variety of savory toppings. Another chat variation we enjoyed is the dahi vada, a deep fried lentil or chickpea fritter covered with a sweet tangy yogurt and sometimes a dash of hot pepper sauce

In this video clip a street vendor serves Tammy a pretty tasty chat:

https://youtu.be/da2YkwXrKJw

Dosa Pancakes on the griddle

We also enjoyed Melayu, a sweet, foamy dessert made from saffron milk,

served in a single use clay pot and a wooden spoon.

As I mentioned at the top of the post, our street food research often includes checking out foodie vlogs, of which there are only a few worth recommending. A consistently good source is Luke Martin's series Chopstick Travels on Youtube. The following link is for the episode on “Varanasi Street Food” which also includes an excellent quality video representation of the city and the ghats. Well worth a look:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=529yH6XcTGU&t=418s

**** And now the ugly side of street food in India. Somewhere along the way, I think we got a bad chat. We normally try to look for the busy stalls with a high turnover, and we drink bottled water or use our Grayal water filter as recommended in India, but eventually your luck runs out!!! We were out of commission for the better part of 2 days. So moving forward with our queasy western stomachs we are feeling a bit less daring, and post recovery I find myself longing for:
Steak and baked potato, BBQ pork chops on the grill, Jersey Mike’s Subs, New Haven style pizza, Fresh pasta marinara, Pan seared Scallops, Fried whole bellied clams, Schnitzel & beer………………………………….