Glossary of Ingredients

Flours, spices, chutneys, pantry basics — if a recipe or a technique guide here calls for it by name, you'll find a plain explanation of what it is on this page.

Ajwain (Carom Seeds): Small seeds with a thyme-like intensity, commonly kneaded into pastry doughs — samosa and kachori casings especially — both for flavour and for their traditional role in easing digestion of fried food.
Amchur (Dried Mango Powder): Dried green mango ground into powder, supplying the souring note in chaat masala and in fillings where fresh citrus would not hold up. Its fruity tartness reads differently from both tamarind and lime.
Atta (Whole Wheat Flour): Whole wheat flour milled fine enough for daily flatbreads, and for puri dough in some regional styles. Bran and germ stay in the mix, which is why it bakes denser and carries more nutty flavour than maida.
Besan (Gram Flour): Ground from skinned, split chickpeas (chana dal), this flour underlies pakora and bhajiya coatings, the batters for dhokla and khandvi, and fried toppings such as sev and boondi. Lumps form easily if water goes in too fast, so whisk the dry flour first and add liquid in stages. A quick dry roast before mixing is standard in several steamed-batter recipes.
Besan Batter Consistency Terms: This library sorts batter thickness into three working categories: ribbon-consistency (an unbroken ribbon falling slowly off a spoon), coating-consistency (a thin, even film on the back of a spoon), and pouring-consistency (flows freely, like heavy cream). These descriptions hold up better than a fixed flour-to-water ratio.
Besan ka Sev: Another name for sev, specifying that gram flour is the base — distinguishing it from similar fried, noodle-shaped garnishes made from other flours.
Boondi: Seasoned gram-flour batter dropped through a perforated spoon into hot oil, forming small fried beads. Sweet versions end up in desserts; the salted kind works into chaat toppings and raita.
Chaat Masala: A savoury-tart spice mix anchored by dried mango powder and black salt, rounded out with roasted cumin, coriander and other ground spices. It works as a finishing sprinkle over finished chaat, fruit or roasted snacks — never cooked into the dish itself.
Chana Dal (Split Chickpeas): Chickpeas split and skinned — not the same as whole chickpeas (chole) — used in various fillings and occasionally tempered whole in South Indian dishes for added texture.
Curry Leaves: Leaves from the curry tree, fried briefly as part of a tempering step in South and West Indian kitchens. They can be used fresh or dried, and despite the name, they have no relation to curry powder.
Dahi (Yogurt): Thick, plain dairy yogurt, whisked until smooth and sometimes given a light touch of salt or sugar before it goes over dahi puri, aloo tikki chaat or papdi chaat. Full-fat yogurt that is well-set keeps its texture best under these toppings.
Date-Tamarind Chutney: A thick, cooked chutney made by simmering tamarind with dates or jaggery and spices. It delivers the sweet-sour counterpoint that offsets chaat's heat and tang.
Dhania (Coriander): One term covering two forms: coriander seed, used whole or ground in spice mixes, and the fresh leaf (cilantro), which goes on as garnish and forms the backbone of green chutney.
Dhokla Batter: A besan batter, either fermented or quickly leavened, steamed into a spongy cake and finished with a mustard-seed-and-curry-leaf tempering. The gram flour batter technique guide walks through handling it correctly.
Garam Masala: A blend built around cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and black pepper, joined by other warming spices. It goes in near the end of cooking so its aroma stays vivid instead of burning off over heat.
Garlic Chutney (Dry): A coarse, dry mix of garlic, dried red chillies and often desiccated coconut, pounded rather than blended into a smooth paste. It is best known as the filling packed into a Mumbai vada pav.
Ghee (Clarified Butter): Butter cooked down until milk solids and water separate out, leaving behind a stable fat with a high smoke point and a nutty smell. Tempering and certain doughs rely on it.
Ginger-Garlic Paste: Fresh ginger and garlic, ground together in roughly equal parts into a smooth paste. It forms the aromatic base in marinades such as chicken tikka and in a range of gravies.
Green Chutney (Coriander-Mint Chutney): An uncooked, blended chutney built from coriander and mint leaves, green chillies and a sour element like lime or raw mango. It appears across nearly every chaat dish and most fried snacks in this library.
Gud / Jaggery: Unrefined sugar made by boiling sugarcane juice or palm sap down to a solid. Chutneys and some spice mixes get a deeper, slightly mineral sweetness from it that refined sugar does not supply.
Haldi (Turmeric): Dried, ground turmeric root, added early in cooking in small quantities for colour and a mild earthy bitterness. Add it too late and it tastes raw and chalky rather than rounded.
Hing (Asafoetida): A strong-smelling resin, typically sold ground and blended with rice flour, that turns savoury and almost umami once it hits hot oil briefly. A pinch at the start of a tempering is standard, particularly in garlic-free cooking.
Idli Rava: Parboiled rice ground to a coarse grit specifically for idli and dosa batters — a different product from wheat-based semolina (sooji), despite a similar texture.
Imli (Tamarind): The sour pulp from inside the tamarind pod, available as a block, concentrate or paste. Simmered down with jaggery and spices, it becomes the sweet-sour chutney that most chaat dishes build around.
Jeera (Cumin Seeds): Whole cumin seeds, almost always the opening move in a tempering (tadka): a brief bloom in hot oil or ghee releases their aroma before the rest of the ingredients join the pan.
Kala Namak (Black Salt): A mineral salt whose naturally occurring sulphur compounds give it a distinct smell, essential to chaat masala and spiced chaat water. A small pinch goes a long way, so it is not swapped in for everyday salt.
Kasuri Methi (Dried Fenugreek Leaves): Fenugreek leaves, dried and crumbled by hand before use, stirred in close to the end of cooking for a slightly bitter, hay-like note common in North Indian gravies and some tikka marinades.
Khoya / Mawa: Whole milk reduced slowly over heat until only a dense, slightly grainy paste of milk solids remains. It turns up in select festive snacks and sweets rather than in standard chaat.
Kokum: A dried, deep-purple fruit rind that functions as a souring agent in parts of Western India, with a fruitier, softer sourness than tamarind. It shows up occasionally in regional chutney variations.
Lal Mirch (Red Chilli Powder): Dried red chillies, ground for both colour and heat. Strength swings widely by regional blend, so any quantity given in this library is a starting point to adjust, not a fixed target.
Maida (Refined Wheat Flour): Refined white wheat flour, low in protein and close in behaviour to cake flour. Samosa and kachori pastry rely on it, as does bhature dough, because it puffs and flakes in a way whole wheat cannot replicate on its own.
Momos Dough: An unleavened dough of refined flour and water, rolled thin enough to wrap around steamed dumpling fillings. It needs enough pliability to pleat cleanly without tearing, but should not turn sticky.
Moong Dal (Split Mung Bean): Small split pulses, available with or without the green skin still on, used in savoury pakoras, select dhokla variations and other lighter batters.
Mustard Oil: An oil pressed from mustard seeds, sharp and pungent on its own. Heating it until it stops smoking, before anything else goes in, tames that raw edge — standard practice across North and East Indian cooking.
Paneer: A fresh cheese that does not melt, made by curdling hot milk with an acid and pressing the resulting curds. It gets cubed and grilled for paneer tikka, or crumbled into stuffed snacks, and needs no aging.
Papdi: A flat, crisp disc fried from a dough of flour, semolina and oil. It forms the base layer under papdi chaat and sev puri, and a properly made one snaps rather than flexes.
Poha (Flattened Rice): Rice that has been parboiled, flattened and dried. No boiling step is required — a quick rinse followed by a short steam softens it fully. It anchors the breakfast dish bearing its name and shows up in several chivda mixes as well.
Puri (Chaat Shell): A small fried sphere of semolina or wheat dough, hollow once it puffs, forming the crisp shell for pani puri and dahi puri. Not to be confused with the puffed wheat bread of the same name served alongside meals.
Rai / Sarson (Mustard Seeds): Round seeds, black or brown, that crackle and pop on contact with hot oil. South and West Indian tempering routinely opens with these, often alongside curry leaves and urad dal.
Rava / Sooji (Semolina): Durum wheat ground coarse, forming the backbone of crisp pani puri shells, upma and instant rava dosa. Fine and coarse grinds behave differently in a dough, so recipes specify which grade is needed rather than leaving it open.
Rice Flour: Rice ground fine, used in certain dosa and idli batter variations and as a thickener in some chutneys or batters. It performs differently from wheat flour and cannot simply substitute in gluten-based dough.
Sabudana (Sago / Tapioca Pearls): Starch pearls extracted from tapioca root. Soaking, not boiling, is how they rehydrate, which makes them a staple during religious fasts since no grain is involved. Vada made from sabudana depends on getting that soak right.
Sev: Gram-flour batter, seasoned and forced through a perforated press straight into hot oil, emerging as thin, crisp strands. It stands alone as a snack and doubles as the crunch layered onto bhel puri and sev puri.
Tadka / Tempering: A quick fry of whole spices, and sometimes aromatics, in hot oil or ghee, used to release their flavour before folding them into a dish that is finished or nearly there. The dedicated technique guide covers this step in full.
Urad Dal (Split Black Gram): A dense, starchy pulse that, after soaking and grinding, is responsible for the lift in idli and dosa batter and the structure in medu vada. Whole and skinned-split forms behave differently and are not interchangeable.