The Kerala Kitchen, Expanded Edition: Recipes and Recollections from the Syrian Christians of South India

Gourmand World Cookbook Award winner

“My copy of The Kerala Kitchen has notes scribbled in it and has turmeric stains on certain pages. Now it’s your turn to enjoy. So line up your spices, ready your grated coconut and go to it. You are in for both a literary and gastronomic treat.”

—Abraham Verghese, author of The Covenant of Water

Now in an expanded edition with new recipes and photographs, this unique cookbook-memoir transports readers to Kerala, a verdant, tropical state on the Malabar Coast of South India.

Since ancient times, seafarers and traders have been drawn by the lure of spices to Kerala. Saint Thomas also traveled this spice route, converting several Brahmin families who later intermarried with Syrians who had settled here; thus was born the vibrant Syrian Christian community of Kerala. Today, ayurvedic massage resorts and backwater cruises make this scenic land a top tourist destination, and spices still draw both travelers and gourmands to its rich culinary heritage. It is this legacy that The Kerala Kitchen brings us, through more than 170 recipes and the stories that accompany them.

Authentic and easy to prepare, these recipes are adapted for the North American kitchen, and accompanied by a guide to spices, herbs, and equipment, as well as a glossary of food terms. Interwoven between these recipes, in the best tradition of the cookbook memoir, are tales of talking doves, toddy shops, traveling chefs and killer coconuts, evoking the beauty of a bygone era as well as the compelling pull of the present one.

Sample recipes:

• Meen Vevichathu (Fish Curry Cooked in a Clay Pot)
• Parippu (Lentils with Coconut Milk)
• Thiyal (Shallots with Tamarind and Roasted Coconut)
• Pesaha Appam (Steamed Rice Bread)
• Paalappam (Lace-Rimmed Pancakes)
• Karikku Pudding (Tender Coconut Pudding)

Lathika George is a Bombay-born Syrian Christian who moved to Kerala during her teens. A culinary enthusiast and organic gardener, she writes about food, farming and environmental issues. Lathika is also the author of Mother Earth, Sister Seed: Travels through India's Farmlands. She lives in Kodaikanal in South India.

Abraham Verghese is a physician and writer and holds the Linda R. Meier and Joan F. Lane Provostial Professorship at Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA. He is the author of the bestselling novel, Cutting for Stone and The Covenant of Water.