Spice and Pantry Glossary

Open a jar and you find a smell, a colour and a job to do. These short notes say what each flour, spice, chutney and cupboard staple is, so the names in the recipes and guides stop being a mystery.

Ajwain (Carom Seeds): Tiny ridged seeds with a thyme-like sharpness. Cooks rub them into samosa and kachori dough to add warmth and, so the tradition goes, to help the stomach cope with fried food.
Amchur (Dried Mango Powder): Unripe mango, sun-dried and ground. It lends a sour, fruity note to chaat masala and to fillings where a wet squeeze of citrus would spoil the texture. Its tartness is distinct from both tamarind and lime.
Atta (Whole Wheat Flour): Wheat ground fine with its bran and germ left in. Home kitchens use it daily for flatbreads, and some regions use it for puris. Expect a heavier chew and a faintly nutty taste next to maida.
Besan (Gram Flour): Pale yellow flour with a toasty, beany smell, ground from chana dal, the husked and split chickpea. Pakora coatings, dhokla, khandvi, sev and boondi all start here. Whisk it slowly into water to keep the lumps away; steamed batters sometimes call for a quick dry roast first.
Besan Batter Consistency Terms: Three phrases describe how thick a batter should be in these pages. Ribbon consistency means it pours off a spoon in a slow, unbroken band. Coating consistency means it leaves a thin film on the back of a spoon. Pouring consistency means it runs freely, like heavy cream. Eyes and spoon give a truer reading than any flour-to-water ratio.
Besan ka Sev: Another name for sev. The longer form tells you the crisp strands are gram-flour based, as opposed to other fried garnishes of similar shape made from different flours.
Boondi: Pea-sized fried droplets that come from pouring seasoned gram-flour batter through a slotted spoon into hot oil. Dessert cooks soak the sweet version in syrup. The salted version is sprinkled on chaat or mixed into yogurt for raita.
Chaat Masala: Tart, salty powder in which amchur and black salt do the talking, with roasted cumin, coriander and more behind them. Shake it over finished chaat, cut fruit or roasted snacks at the last moment. It is not cooked into the dish.
Chana Dal (Split Chickpeas): Chickpeas split and stripped of their skins, quite different from whole chickpeas (chole). Some stuffings use it, and in South Indian cooking it is sometimes tempered whole to add a nutty crunch.
Curry Leaves: Glossy green leaves of the curry tree that sputter in hot oil as part of South and West Indian tempering. Fresh or dried, they give a distinctive aroma. They have no connection to curry powder.
Dahi (Yogurt): Plain, thick yogurt made from dairy milk. Whisk it smooth, with a little sugar or salt if you like, then spoon it over dahi puri, aloo tikki chaat or papdi chaat. Full-fat, well-set yogurt keeps its body best.
Date-Tamarind Chutney: Dark, thick, cooked sauce of tamarind and dates or jaggery simmered with spice. It supplies the sweet-and-sour weight that offsets the heat and tang on a chaat plate.
Dhania (Coriander): Two ingredients under one name: the dried seeds, used whole or ground in spice blends, and the fresh leaves (cilantro) that finish dishes and form the body of green chutney.
Dhokla Batter: Besan batter that is either fermented or lifted quickly with a leavener, then steamed into a soft, springy cake and topped with a tempering of mustard seeds and curry leaves. The gram flour batter guide shows how to handle it.
Garam Masala: A fragrant mix of warming spices, usually cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and black pepper among them. Stir it in toward the end of cooking so the perfume stays fresh instead of boiling away.
Garlic Chutney (Dry): Red, crumbly mix of garlic, dried chillies and often desiccated coconut, pounded and left coarse. It is the secret smear inside a Mumbai vada pav.
Ghee (Clarified Butter): Butter cooked slowly until its water evaporates and its milk solids are strained off. What remains is a golden fat that stores well, tolerates high heat and smells of toasted nuts. Cooks use it for tempering and in some doughs.
Ginger-Garlic Paste: Equal parts fresh ginger and garlic, ground until smooth. Marinades for chicken tikka and many gravies start with it.
Green Chutney (Coriander-Mint Chutney): Raw, bright blend of coriander, mint, green chillies and something sour, such as lime or raw mango. You meet it beside almost every chaat and many fried snacks.
Gud / Jaggery: Raw sugar made by boiling sugarcane juice or palm sap until it sets. It tastes deeper and a little mineral compared with white sugar, which is why chutneys and spice mixes use it.
Haldi (Turmeric): Dried turmeric root ground into a golden powder. A small amount adds colour and a mild earthy bitterness. Add it early, as it tastes raw and chalky when stirred in right before serving.
Hing (Asafoetida): Resin with a fierce smell that turns savoury and almost meaty after a few seconds in hot oil. Usually sold ground and mixed with rice flour. A pinch begins many temperings, and it stands in for onion and garlic in dishes that leave them out.
Idli Rava: Coarse grit made from parboiled rice, milled for idli and dosa batters. Easy to confuse with sooji, but sooji is wheat.
Imli (Tamarind): Sticky, sour pulp from the tamarind pod, sold in blocks, as paste or as concentrate. Cooked down with jaggery and spices, it makes the dark sweet-sour chutney that most chaat plates need.
Jeera (Cumin Seeds): The seed that opens most temperings. It sizzles in hot oil or ghee for a few seconds and gives off its aroma before anything else touches the pan.
Kala Namak (Black Salt): Pinkish-grey mineral salt that smells faintly of eggs and sulphur because of the compounds it contains naturally. It gives chaat masala and spiced chaat water their signature smell. Use by the pinch. It is a seasoning accent and cannot replace ordinary salt.
Kasuri Methi (Dried Fenugreek Leaves): Dried fenugreek leaves with a slightly bitter, hay-like perfume. Crush them in your palms and drop them in near the end. North Indian gravies and some tikka marinades rely on them.
Khoya / Mawa: Whole milk boiled down slowly until only dense, slightly grainy milk solids are left. It belongs more to festive snacks and sweets than to everyday chaat.
Kokum: Dried rind of a deep purple fruit, used in Western India to sour dishes. Its tartness is fruitier and gentler than tamarind's, and it turns up in a few regional chutneys.
Lal Mirch (Red Chilli Powder): Dried red chillies milled to powder for colour and heat. Strength varies enormously between regional blends, so treat the amounts in these recipes as a starting point and adjust to the powder in your own jar.
Maida (Refined Wheat Flour): Soft white wheat flour, sifted fine and low in protein, much like cake flour in the hand. Samosa and kachori shells and bhature dough depend on it for a tender, flaky or ballooning crumb that whole-wheat flour on its own will not give.
Momos Dough: Plain dough of refined flour and water, no yeast, rolled thin to wrap steamed dumpling fillings. It needs to be soft enough to pleat without splitting, but never tacky.
Moong Dal (Split Mung Bean): Small split mung beans, with or without their green skins. They go into savoury pakoras, a few dhokla variations and lighter snack batters.
Mustard Oil: Sharp, pungent oil pressed from mustard seeds. Cooks in parts of North and East India heat it until it quits smoking, which takes away the raw sting.
Paneer: Fresh, mild cheese formed when hot milk is curdled with acid and the curds are pressed. It holds its shape under heat instead of melting. Cooks grill it in cubes for paneer tikka or crumble it into fillings. No ageing is needed.
Papdi: Flat, crisp disc of fried dough, about the size of a large coin, made from flour, semolina and oil. Papdi chaat and sev puri sit on top of it. When it is right, it breaks with a clean snap and never bends.
Poha (Flattened Rice): Rice that was parboiled, rolled flat and dried to papery flakes. A rinse and a gentle steam are all it needs, no boiling. It anchors the breakfast dish of the same name and bulks up certain chivda snack mixes.
Puri (Chaat Shell): In chaat, the tiny hollow ball of fried semolina or wheat dough that puffs up crisp and empty inside, waiting for a filling. Pani puri and dahi puri use it. Do not mix it up with the big soft puffed bread that shares its name on a thali.
Rai / Sarson (Mustard Seeds): Round black or brown seeds that crackle and leap the moment hot oil touches them. They start many tempering sequences in South and West India, usually beside curry leaves and urad dal.
Rava / Sooji (Semolina): Gritty golden meal from durum wheat. It gives pani puri shells their crunch and turns into upma and instant rava dosa. Recipes name the fine or the coarse grade because each cooks differently.
Rice Flour: Rice milled to powder. A few dosa and idli batters include it, and some chutneys and coatings use it as a thickener. It behaves unlike wheat flour and fails as a substitute in doughs that need gluten.
Sabudana (Sago / Tapioca Pearls): Little white beads of starch pressed from tapioca root. Sabudana vada is built from them, and they are popular on fasting days since no grain is involved. Soak them until they swell. Dropping them in boiling water ruins the texture.
Sev: Fine golden threads of fried, seasoned gram-flour dough, squeezed through a perforated press straight into the oil. Eaten alone by the handful, or piled over bhel puri and sev puri for crackle.
Tadka / Tempering: The step of frying whole spices, and sometimes aromatics, in hot oil or ghee for a few seconds so their flavour is released, then pouring the lot into a finished or nearly finished dish. The technique guide covers it in detail.
Urad Dal (Split Black Gram): Dense, starchy pulse that, once soaked and ground, puffs up idli and dosa batter and gives medu vada its body. The skinned split and the whole forms behave differently, so one cannot replace the other.