India by what it cooks: 13 days
There is no such thing as Indian food. There are perhaps thirty cuisines that share a spice cupboard and agree on almost nothing else, and the distance between a Punjabi dhaba and a Keralan fish curry is the distance between Naples and Copenhagen.
- Duration
- 13 days
- Pace
- Moderate
- Hotel changes
- 5
- Best months
- Oct, Nov, Dec, Feb, Mar
- From
- $3,290 per person
This route takes four of them seriously: Mughal and street-food Delhi, Punjabi Amritsar, Rajasthani Jaipur and coastal Kerala. It involves four internal flights, and we say so plainly at the top rather than burying it, because that is the price of eating across a country this size in under two weeks.
Who it suits: people whose best travel memories are meals, and anyone who likes cooking more than monuments. Vegetarians will eat extraordinarily well, and we mean that literally rather than politely.
Your specialist: your named India specialist, with our Delhi office booking the kitchens.
Day by day
Day 1: Arrive Delhi. Transfer, a quiet hotel, nothing scheduled. Most flights land before dawn.
Day 2: Old Delhi at breakfast. On foot at seven, before the lanes fill: the parathas of Gali Paranthe Wali, kachori and jalebi at stalls that have been in the same family for a century, then the wholesale spice market at Khari Baoli, where the air genuinely makes you cough. Lunch of Mughlai kebabs behind the Jama Masjid. Afternoon off, because you will need it.
Day 3: Delhi, hands in the flour. A cooking session in a private home in one of the old south Delhi colonies: the spice grinding, the tempering, and why the order of ingredients is the whole technique. Afternoon at Humayun’s Tomb and Sunder Nursery, then qawwali singing at the Nizamuddin dargah, which happens on Thursday evenings and is one of the great things to do in the city.
Day 4: Fly to Amritsar. Ninety minutes. Late afternoon at the Golden Temple, when the marble cools and the gold takes the last of the light.
Day 5: Amritsar, the world’s largest kitchen. The temple at dawn, then the langar: a volunteer kitchen that feeds tens of thousands of people, free, every single day, and will hand you a knife and a mountain of garlic if you want to help. Afternoon at the Partition Museum, which is not comfortable and is the best museum in northern India. Punjabi dhaba dinner, tandoor and all.
Day 6: Amritsar to Jaipur. A flying day, via Delhi, arriving mid-afternoon. Easy evening and a first Rajasthani dinner: laal maas if you eat meat, dal baati churma if you do not.
Day 7: Jaipur, forts then kitchens. Amber Fort at opening, done in two hours. Then a Rajasthani cooking class with a family, learning the desert techniques that come from cooking without fresh vegetables or much water.
Day 8: Jaipur, markets and makers. The old city bazaars with someone who knows what things cost, the spice and vegetable market at dawn if you are willing, blue pottery and block printing workshops, and a thali lunch that will end your day early.
Day 9: Fly to Kochi. Most of a travel day, via Delhi or Bengaluru. Evening in Fort Kochi, and a Kathakali performance where you arrive early to watch the two hours of make-up, which is more interesting than the show.
Day 10: Kochi, the coast. The fish market and the Chinese fishing nets at first light, buying what you will eat for lunch. Then Mattancherry: the spice godowns, the synagogue and the old trading streets of Jew Town. A Syrian Christian home lunch of fish moilee, appam and beef, a combination that exists nowhere else in India.
Day 11: Kochi to the backwaters. Ninety minutes to Kumarakom, then onto a private boat at midday. Lunch cooked on board, a toddy shop stop for karimeen fried in a banana leaf, and a night moored in a paddy-field channel rather than in the Alleppey traffic jam.
Day 12: Backwaters to Kochi. Off the boat after breakfast and back to Fort Kochi. Afternoon free, and a last dinner we choose carefully.
Day 13: Departure from Kochi.
What is included
Accommodation with breakfast, four internal flights, private cars and drivers throughout, the guided Old Delhi and Mattancherry food walks, two cooking sessions with families, the langar visit, the Kathakali performance, a private backwater boat with full board and crew, all entries, and a WhatsApp group with your consultant and our Delhi office.
Dietary notes, and the flying
Vegetarians and vegans. India is the easiest country in the world for vegetarians and this itinerary loses nothing without meat. Vegans need briefing in advance because ghee, curd and coconut milk are not interchangeable in Indian kitchens, and our Delhi office handles that with each host rather than leaving it to the moment.
Allergies and chilli. Both are workable, in advance and in writing. Nut allergies in particular need care in north Indian gravies.
Getting ill. We put the street food walk on day two deliberately, guided, at stalls we know. That is safer than the hotel buffet on day six and it removes the fear early. Drink sealed water, avoid ice for the first few days, and carry rehydration salts. Most people have one bad day in thirteen.
If four flights is too many. Cut Amritsar and add two nights in Lucknow, reachable by train, for Awadhi cooking that is the equal of anything on this route. Or cut Kerala entirely and go deeper into the north, which reduces the trip to two flights and eleven days.
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