10 Authentic Food of Bihar

Yes, we are starting our list with this national food of Bihar because it certainly earned the food culture of Bihar nationwide popularity. Here is more on the dish. Sattu and wheat flour along with some spices are kneaded and shaped into small balls. The flour balls are then grilled in an open flame and dipped into ghee. Litti is done! Time to make the chokha. Mix mashed potato, brinjal, tomatoes and spices and chokha is ready. Now, break a piece of the litti and have it with some chokha and enjoy the deliciousness.

This is a kind of laddoo that is served as prasad at the Hanuman Mandir (near Patna Railway Station), a famous tourist place in Bihar. Let’s see how it is made. Gram flour, cashew, raisin, sugar, cardamoms and saffron are mixed and then cooked in ghee. When it turns into a sticky mix, small balls are rolled in the shape of a round laddoo. Needless to say, naivedyams are super tasty and they melt in your mouth.

Chandrakala, sounds quite nice, no? Much like its name, the look and taste of this dessert are quite nice. Small flour doughs are rolled, then stuffed with a sweet mixture and finally, shaped like a half-moon. The edges are closed with a nice pattern. The sweet stuffing includes khoya, dry fruits, coconut and for that special flavour, a bit of cardamom. The half-moon-shaped chandrakalas are then deep-fried and dipped into a sugar syrup. Crispy from the outside and soft from the inside, each bite of this special dish of Bihar is perfect!

Looking for some authentic Bihari snacks? You can rely on a plate of chana ghugni. It is spicy and tangy and is just tasty. If your tastebuds are convinced, here goes the recipe. Boil some chana (chickpea) and then pan fry the chana preferably in mustard oil (for the authentic Bihari flavour) along with spices, onions and chuda (flattened rice). Add chilli if you like spicy food. And your perfect evening snack is ready!

A crispy and sweet snack on the list of famous Bihar food items. Wheat flour, sugar and mawa are mixed into a dough. The dough then is rolled, folded a few times and then deep-fried. What you get after that is a flaky, crunchy, sweet delicacy. Khaja has another variant named belgrami. The difference between the two is that instead of wheat flour, milk solids are used belgrami. Also, khaja is a little sweeter than belgrami. We say, try both and see which one you like more.

So far, we have had vegetarian authentic Bihari food and that is because the food culture in the state is predominantly vegetarian. But now we introduce a non-vegetarian delicacy of Bihar, kebabs or the Bihari kabab. Boneless lamb, marinated in a mix of raw papaya paste and spices and grilled on charcoal with splashes of ghee. Succulent is the word you will think of after having a bite of the kabab. Other than the Bihari kabab, two more kababs have become quite famous in the state. Mughu’s mutton kebabs in Kadamkuan, Patna and Richie Rich’s reshmi kebabs in Rajendra Nagar, Patna.

Peda is a traditional Indian dessert. Milk, khoya, sugar, kesar (saffron) and cardamom powder are cooked together for some time. Once it becomes a dough-like consistency, it is shaped into small round pedas. Some pedas also have nice designs on them. The state of Bihar has peda in their food culture for a long time. The people here are very fond of the pedas of Deoghar (in present-day Jharkhand). Buy some peda in any local shop of Bihar or even better if you can get your hands on some Devghar peda and take a bite. You will become fond of them too!

Another traditional Bihar food name. But the speciality of this dish is that it is a huge part of the festivals of the state. Local people make laung-latikas in their homes during festivals. If you can get invited to any household of Bihar during any festival, you can taste an authentic laung-latika. The preparation of this dish is similar to that of a chandrakala. A flour dough, stuffed with sweet stuffing, deep-fried and dipped into a sugar syrup. The one thing that makes laung-latika stand apart is the pungent taste that comes from the laung (clove) placed in the middle of the delicacy.

Dal, as we already said earlier, is a staple food of Bihar. Dal peetha is a kind of dumpling with a stuffing made of dal. Rice flour dough is kneaded and small balls of dough are rolled. Each flour ball is stuffed with a stuffing of dal and spices and then steamed or fried. Often, instead of dumplings, the stuffed flour balls are rolled like a flatbread and then deep-fried. These are called dal puri.

Call this Bihar’s special cookies. A dough made with flour and jaggery is deep-fried to make these sweet cookies. The fun part is, thekuas are made in different shapes and sizes. Different thekua moulds are easily available in the market that you can buy to shape the thekuas. Or just make a dough ball, press it a little to flatten it and then make designs with a fork or spoon. When it comes to the taste, we will surely give thekua full marks!

Your travel guide to Bihar’s culinary world is now ready. Try these dishes and see how impressed you are with each bite!