Delhi was the capital city of the Mughal dynasty in the earlier years. This was the place that gave birth to Mughlai cuisine. There is no one particular cuisine that is identified as the taste of Delhi. Since diverse kinds of population are settled here, today, Delhi’s trademark in terms of cuisine is nothing but the concept of unity in diversity. You can get to taste a variety of dishes like Biryani, kebabs, tandoori, Chinese, Continental, South Indian, Punjabi, fresh jalebis, chole bhature, kachori, dahivada, pavbhaji and many more in Delhi.

Street food joints are found in large numbers in Delhi as more and more people started consuming fast food. The old market of Chandni Chowk is abuzz with many road side eatery joints selling lip-smacking local delicacies. If you visit this place, you should never miss the ParanthewaliGali, a street exclusively dedicated to Paratha delicacies of many flavours. Many Prime Ministers and other celebrities have visited this place to taste these delicacies. Apart from these, Punjabi Dhabas and five star hotels too have come up in plenty in Delhi to suit the tastes of diverse range of people living in Delhi. Bukhara and Karim Hotel are some of the famous places to eat in Delhi.

While the cosmopolitan cities of Mumbai and Bangalore are famous for partying and drinking respectively, Delhi is famous for eating. People love to eat different kinds of food in the capital city.

Any function or wedding in Delhi is incomplete without an exhaustive spread of food items laid out on the table. Hosts of parties are quite proud about the dishes that they have prepared for their guests and guests, on the other hand, attend functions in Delhi with the prime thought of food in their mind. The delightful aromas that these items emanate generate saliva in one’s mouth just by the look of food. Hence it is needless to say that Delhi food is definitely a class of its own.

It is often said and believed that a way to get into a Delhiite’s heart is to feed him or her well. This way you can easily win over him or her and the person might be ready to bequeath his or her will to you. This is how important food is in a Delhiite’s life.

Though there are many communities in Delhi, one of the most dominant is the Punjabi community. Therefore the food is inspired a lot by Punjabi cuisine. Just like in Punjab, breads and other items are cooked in general dollops of ghee, butter and cheese. You name the kind of cuisine and you will find it here! This is because people from almost all communities are settled here and their eating styles have impacted the Delhi cuisine in a big way.

Apart from local delicacies, the other style of food that is most commonly available in road side food joints is Chinese. Do not be surprised to find awesome Chinese delicacies at affordable rates at your local eateries. If you are lucky, you could even stumble upon Italian or Thai food in your local outlets. There are many takers for these international cuisines as well in the city of Delhi.

Delhi Street Food

When you visit Delhi, you must never miss to eat the local delicacies available at the street food stalls here. Chandni Chowk, an ancient market, is probably the best place to have street food and it is also nicknamed “food capital of India”.

If you want to enjoy street food at its fullest form, you should be able to forget your social designation and indulge in food just like somebody who has not seen food for long. A visit to Chandni Chowk will show you how vibrant the area is throughout the day with its incessant noise of Paratha sellers, sweet sellers and savoury sellers.

You could start your food sojourn with ParanthewaliGali  - a street dedicated to Paratha shops right from the 1870s. Here soft and flaky parathas are cooked with huge spoons of ghee and served along with accompaniments that include different kinds of chutneys. This is a place that has witnessed many celebrities from time to time like Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Vijayalakshmi Pandit, Jayaprakash Narayan, Atal Bihari Vajpayee etc.

Some of the other food joints that are famous for their delicious and authentic food items are:

• Darbar (Ashoka Hotel)
• Delhi KaAangan (Hyatt Regency)
• Baluchi (The Hilton)
• Corbetts (Claridges)
• Bukhara (Maurya Sheraton)
• EI Arab (Regal Building)
• (HauzKhas Village)
• Rodeo (Connaught Place)
• Chor Bizarre (Hotel Broadway)

The Punjabi Cuisine - The Most Famous Delhi Food

One of the famous cuisines which inspire the Delhi style of food is Punjabi cuisine. There are two trademarks of Punjabi food. One is that they are cooked with generous dollops of ghee and butter. The second is that they are cooked by mixing up different styles of food like Thai, Lebanese, Spanish, Italian, French, Israeli, Moroccan, Swiss and the like. Similarly Delhi cuisine too exhibits lots of fusions and combinations.

Before the advent of Punjabis, Delhi was quite conservative in terms of eating out culture. People living here before the Independence Era would not venture to eat out, as they considered that the food and the people cooking it would be unclean (that is, of a lower caste). This kind of thinking was most commonly found in conservative Brahmin community.

However, during partition, when Punjabis fled from their state and got settled in Delhi, the overall culture in Delhi started witnessing drastic changes. It was a Punjabi family which first set up a local eatery by the name of Tandoori (specialising in Punjabi and Mughlai cuisine) at Old Delhi, right next to the Red Fort.

International Cuisine in Delhi

If you are looking to taste some authentic international cuisine, you must visit five star hotels like Taj Palace (Orient Express) and joints like Flavours and Rodeo. Hotel Flavours, founded by an Italian, guarantees the authenticity of food available here. Some five star hotels also serve you rare cuisine styles like Indonesian, Turkish, Greek, Spanish etc.