Overview
- Signature Dishes: Street food
- Opening Times & Days: 8am to 10pm, daily
- Address: Pushkar, Rajasthan, India
- Contact: N/A
- Reservation: No
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Summary
Samosas, kachoris, bhel puri and chole aloo tikki chaat were some of the best street food we had in Pushkar. The variety, cheap prices and all-day-long availability made it a great option for day time meals.
Best Pushkar Street Food
Breakfast
For breakfast, we would head down to the Main Market Road in the centre of town and pick one of the many road side restaurants to have breakfast. Most of them serve the same fare, so we would try and pick one that looked clean and hygienic (if that’s possible in India!).
A couple of days, we had puris and sabji for breakfast. A puri is a small, deep fried bread made of wheat flour that is crisp on the outside and soft on the inside. Sabji, meaning vegetable in Hindi, usually consists of potato in a masala gravy that is hot, spicy and full of flavour. The dish also came with a spicy dal (lentil soup), which had a strong flavour of cumin.
The combination of puris and sabji is delicious first thing in the morning, and is a popular breakfast option for a lot of Indians. At only Rs 30 to 40 for a dish, it made a cheap, yet satisfying breakfast option for us.
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Another breakfast option for us in Pushkar was samosas and kachoris. A samosa is a deep fried wheat puff with a spicy vegetable (mostly potato) filling. Originating in Rajasthan, a kachori is a crispy Indian snack that is stuffed with a filling of lentils and spices.
Samosas and kachoris are staple Indian snacks that can be eaten any time of the day. It made a great breakfast option for us, and we ended up having them for breakfast on most occasions. Samosas are so popular in India that they can be found easily in most cities around the sub-continent. When a samosa or kachori costs only Rs 10 a piece, it is a great snack to have any time of the day.
Sweets
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There are several Indian sweet shops around the streets of Pushkar. They are very popular with pilgrims who offer sweets as part of puja prasad (food offerings) at temples. They are also really delicious and come in a wide variety of colours and flavours.
Most sweet shops have a display cabinet in which the sweets are stored for sale. Sometimes the sweets are put out in front of the shops, so that people can see them while walking past, making it harder to resist as we found out.
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My favourite Indian sweet is the jalebi. It is made by deep frying a wheat flour batter in pretzel or circular shapes, which are then soaked in sugar syrup.
These sweets are served warm or cold. They have a somewhat chewy texture with a crystallized sugary exterior coating. Citric acid or lime juice is sometimes added to the syrup, as well as rose water or other flavours, such as kewra water.
I love jalebis so much that I would have them almost daily while in India. When they cost Rs 20 for 4 pieces, the only thing I had to worry about was it going to my hips.
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One Rajasthani specialty that Pushkar does quite well is an Indian sweet called kalakand. It is a popular Indian sweet made out of solidified, sweetened milk and cottage cheese. It is mostly prepared during festivals, and being the Annual Pushkar Camel Fair, this sweet was produced in huge quantities while we were there.
As with most Indian sweets, it takes a long time to prepare. A huge pan is kept on a flame and large amount of milk is boiled stirring it continuously till it is thickened. Sugar and dry fruits are added for flavour.
We had a small amount in a paper plate, which only cost us Rs 10 which was a great buy. The kalakand had an interesting texture, which was more like clotted cheese but creamy at the same time. It was very sweet, so we could only eat a very small amount.
Pushkar Camel Fair
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The Annual Pushkar Camel Fair is a great place to find several stalls selling all kinds of street food in Pushkar. As much as it’s about the camels and shops selling everything from kitchen utensils to herding sticks, it is also a food fair. Spoilt for choice, we tried to have street food in Pushkar we hadn’t eaten before.
First up was bhel puri, a popular Mumbai street food, which has spread to most parts of India where it has been modified to suit local food availability. The bhel puri we ate was made up of a mixture of puffed rice, potatoes, onions, spices, and chutney, and topped with sev (a fried snack shaped like thin noodles made from chick pea flour).
The combination of ingredients gave it several layers of flavour. The crunch from the sev and the softness from the puffed rice made this snack a delight to eat. For Rs 10, it was a lovely, light snack we had during the day.
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Among all the street food in Pushkar, our favourite was chole aloo tikki chaat which we also found at the Pushkar Camel Fair. It is a popular street food of North India, which has also made its way to other parts of India due to its delicious flavours. We had it several times during our trip around India, and it was a such a treat when we found it.
Aloo tikki are spiced potato patties, whereas chole is a spicy and hot North Indian chickpea curry. The combination of the crispy potato patties and the spicy chickpea curry is absolutely delicious, especially when served with coriander and mint chutney. The aromatic taste emanating from the chole, the chutney and the pungent onion gives the snack a great depth of flavour. At Rs 20 for a plate, it was a great and filling snack for the day.
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On a hot and humid day in Pushkar, nothing is better than a glass of cold sugarcane juice. There were several trolleys around the Pushkar Camel Fair with men making sugarcane juice. I liked my sugarcane juice with a dash of lime, which not only added more flavour to the juice, but also gave it a sweet and sour flavour, which was very refreshing. At Rs 10 a glass, we had a few glasses during the day without making a dent in the wallet.
Graham and I really enjoyed the street food in Pushkar, both in the centre of town and at the Pushkar Camel Fair. The variety, cheap prices, and wonderful flavours of the street food made it a great option for meals during the day.
