Vannakam Food!

By and large, South Indian cuisine is perhaps the hottest of all Indian food. Meals are centered around rice or rice-based dishes. Rice is combined with Sambaar (a soup-like lentil dish tempered with whole spices and chillies) and rasam (a hot-sour soup like lentil dish), dry and curried vegetables and meat dishes and a host of coconut-based chutneys and poppadums (deep-fried crispy lentil pancakes).

 

Madras coffee is popular in South Indian restaurants throughout the world.
The South Indian food is a brilliant blend of flavors, colors, seasoning, nutritional balance, fragrance, taste, and visual appeal.

 

A typical traditional meal
in South India is served on a "vazhaillai", a freshly cut banana leaf.
The Sappad or food that is served on a banana leaf (even the size of the leaf varies from one community to another) is displayed like an identity card.

 

 

 

Hyderabadi cuisine is a direct result from the kitchens of the Nizams or Muslim rulers.  The Hyderabadi cuisine is the amalgamation of Muslim techniques and meats with the vibrant spices and ingredients of the predominantly local Hindu people.  Hydrabadi cuisine is the ultimate in fine dining.  Its tastes range from sour and the sweet, the hot and the salty and studded with dry fruits and nuts. One of India's finest foods, the biryani or rice with meats and brinjal (or eggplant) or baghare baiganis are the jewels of Hyderabadi cooking.