What are the differences between Indian & Pakistani cuisine?
No doubt somebody with more expertise will be along soon but I don’t think this is a meaningful question as it assumes India and Pakistan each have just one cuisine. The Indian sub-continent has hundreds of regional cuisines. India itself has hundreds and I would expect Pakistan to have a fair few.
Broadly speaking, there are both regional and religious differences.
At a regional level, Pakistani food is similar to northwestern India, while Indian food has wider regional variations.
At a religious level, Pakistani food is influenced by Islam, so pork is right out, and lamb is a commonly used meat. Indian food is most influenced by Hinduism (though there are Muslims, Jains, Sikhs, etc., in India too), so beef is right out, and vegetarian food is very common.
I am not that familiar with Pakistani cuisine expect what I have eaten in a few restaurants - and that, we all know, is a pretty poor indicator.
Let me make an attempt to list a few kinds of Indian cuisine (I may have left out a few):
Mughlai - as the name suggests, it was popularized by the Mughals - rulers of Northern parts of India
Punjabi - robust, wheat and dairy based. Some of the most popular foods in Indian restaurants belong to these two types
Naan, parathas, Tandoori type of cooking, Saag paneer, lots of chicken
Rajasthani - can be fiery. Food that does not spoil easily, because of the high heat and desert like state…Dal Baati (Lentils)…lots of papad
Gujarati - almost all foods have an undercurrent of sweetness, even the most fiery dishes. Dhoklas (steamed fermented batter), Undhiu (veggie mix)
Maharashtrian - blandish, or super fiery - depends on region
Tamil Nadu - Extremely distinctive - Idlis (steamed rice and lentil batter), Dosas (Crepes), Sambar (Fiery lentil soup). Use of Curry leaves, coriander.
Kerala - Lots of fish, tons of coconut
Andhra - Super fiery. Biryanis (Spiced rice dish - like pilaf), Some fish
Bengal - Again lots of fish, use of ground mustard and mustard oil, par boiled rice, Fennel and fenugreek seeds to spice things. Absolutely the most divine dairy based desserts (rosogolla, sandesh)
I am sure I am missing a ton of cuisines and the regional variations of each.
Quite different, a lot more meat, especially in the North of the Country.
This wasn’t exactly what was asked, but in my experience if you like Indian food you’ll probably like Pakistani food. Although vegetarian food is apparently more common in India due to the Hindu population, as a vegetarian I’ve never had any trouble getting a great meal in a Pakistani restaurant.
I’m told Pakistani cuisine is more similar to Northern Indian cuisine than Southern Indian cuisine. But the thing is most Indian restaurants in the U.S. seem to serve food from all over India, so the distinction is somewhat lost on me.
Resturants in the west in my experience tend to stick to a very narrow band of food. Case in ppint there is one Balochi dish; Sajji is impossible to find outside Pakistan, yet within Pakistan most good resturants serve it. In all my time in London I found one place that made it and that on request… and charged an arm and a leg for it.
As for food depends where you are from in Pakistan I suppose. The cusine is very diverse. The Punjab would be (superficially) similar to parts of N India. The Frontier and Balochistan have very different cuisine. Pakistani food is also a lot less spicy that Indian food, S Indian cusine is bloody insane… and very delicious.
Other people have already answered very well. I’ll add that I am always pleased when I find a Pakistani or Afghani store or restaurant opening here as opposed to a South Indian store - the foods are more familiar, the tastes closer to my own, etc. South Indian tends to be quite different.
I have found Pakistani food to be very similar to northwest Indian food, with only a few notable differences –
- The use of beef
- Very little seafood
- The meat curries are often very fat-based, often just plain oil or rendered fat, not like the complex sauces of other Indian cuisines.
“Curries” don’t really exist as such in Pakistani food or to the extent that they are in Bharat. Again it would be incorrect to rely on what you see in resturants in foreign countries, those serve local clientel and a very narrow band of foods. So say Tayyabs in London which claims to be a real Pakistani resturant really serves food from one part of one province (Punjab) as well as some Indian dishes which are popular. No sign of good “nehari” or “sajji” or “Peshawari kebab” or “Joint”. I mean come on!
Seafood is found more in the south and its very good IMO.
I have had nehari and a range of kebabs (can’t recall whether Peshawari was one of them) … all good stuff. There’s a Pakistani grocery near my house and they have a guy who makes home-cooked Pakistani food. Good stuff, but as I said, overall very similar to Indian food in the adjacent parts of India. Actually, the curries I experienced are probably more from Panjabi Muslims on the Indian side of the border, so not truly Pakistani.