From Temple Kitchens to 5-Star Buffets, How Curry Found Its Rhythm
For centuries, India’s culinary story has simmered in the vast, generous kitchens of its temples. Long before “curry” became a global ambassador of Indian cuisine, it was a rhythm, slow, devotional, and deeply human, echoing from sanctified hearths where food was not merely cooked, but offered, shared, and lived.
From these sacred cauldrons, the Indian idea of curry took its earliest breaths: simple, sattwik, nourishing, and designed to serve not just the palate, but the soul.
Prasadam: The Food That Blesses Before It Feeds
Temple food was never just sustenance. It has always been prasadam, a divine blessing that becomes nourishment. In ancient India, where travel was arduous and pilgrims walked for days, temple kitchens were the beating heart of hospitality. Feeding the hungry was a conscious act of compassion, a form of seva, and even today, these meals remain the only dependable food source for many senior citizens, the poor, and daily-wage earners.
This sacred food is characterised by its purity and balance. Temple curries tend to be gentle and sattwik, crafted with intention and respect for the body and spirit.
A Journey Through India’s Temple Kitchens
Udupi Shri Krishna Temple: The Quiet Poetry of Sattwik Cuisine
The Udupi Shri Krishna Temple is renowned for its humble yet masterful vegetarian cooking. Its kitchen practices are rooted in ritual, creating dishes such as rasam, sambhar, kootu, and simple vegetable curries that rely on coconut, cumin, curry leaves, and ghee for their signature flavour. These preparations are light, balanced, and deeply comforting. Over time, this unique style of cooking shaped the identity of vegetarian restaurants across the country and quietly influenced the flavours found in modern buffet counters.
The Langar at the Golden Temple: A Curry of Equality
The langar at the Golden Temple in Amritsar remains one of the world’s largest and most inspiring community kitchens. It operates through pure volunteer service, serving dal, sabzi, rotis, and kadhi to anyone who walks in, regardless of religion, class, or background. The simplicity of its flavours makes the langar feel like a universal home-cooked meal. Its scale that feeds thousands daily demonstrates the extraordinary impact food can have when prepared in the spirit of equality and service.
Tirumala: A Lesson in Precision and Compassion
At Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam, the temple kitchens are engineered to feed millions with astonishing efficiency. The free meal service includes comforting staples such as rice, sambar, vegetable curry, sweet pongal, and buttermilk. Every element is designed to nourish the pilgrim who has journeyed with devotion.
The paid offerings at Govindas restaurants, rooted in ISKCON’s sattwik philosophy, emphasise purity, balanced meals, and clean vegetarian cooking that many travellers seek.
Puri Jagannath: The World’s Oldest Continuously Operating Kitchen
The Jagannath Temple in Puri houses one of the oldest and most distinctive temple kitchens in the world. Here, food is cooked in earthen pots stacked in tiers over wood fires, imparting a unique flavour and aroma to the curries and khichdis. This kitchen preserves some of India’s earliest styles of curry, that are simple, slow-cooked, and built on the natural essence of seasonal vegetables and grains.
Annakoot Utsav: Curry as Celebration
Annakoot, celebrated the day after Diwali, transforms food into a grand offering. Hundreds of sabzis, kadhis, lentils, and sweets are prepared as part of a massive, mountain-like spread for the deity. This ritual reflects the cultural idea that curry has never been a single dish in India; it has always been a vast universe of styles, techniques, and regional interpretations. Annakoot continues to inspire modern restaurant menus, especially during festive seasons, where chefs recreate elements of this abundance.
From Temple Halls to 5-Star Buffets: Curry Evolves, But Its Soul Remains
As India’s hospitality industry evolved, the foundational philosophy of temple cooking naturally found its way into five-star buffet menus. Today’s luxury buffets often highlight Udupi-style vegetable stews, Amritsari dal and kadhi, Puri-inspired vegetable preparations, sattwik dishes from Govindas, and sambhar influenced by the kitchens of Tirumala. During festive periods, culinary teams often craft special menus inspired by Annakoot, focusing on abundance, variety, and regional authenticity.
These dishes are not selected merely for taste, they are chosen because they evoke memory, culture, and the comfort of shared history. At a buffet counter, curry becomes more than a recipe; it becomes a storyteller bridging the past with the present.
The Rhythm of Curry: A Journey That Continues
From the sanctity of temple kitchens to the refinement of luxury hotel buffets, curry has travelled through time with grace. It has absorbed regional identities, embraced cultural influences, and adapted to contemporary palates, all while retaining its core purpose: to nourish, to comfort, and to unify.
In my book Romance of the Indian Curry, these extraordinary yet simple creation unfold across chapters, tracing how a humble preparation evolved into an international culinary icon. The rhythm of curry continues, carrying with it the heart of India, which is diverse, generous, rooted, and ever-evolving.
Published by Shubhi Publishers, here’s the link to get your own Romance of the Indian Curry: https://amzn.in/d/eanSqyv