Sunday, 05 March 2023 | Vandana Bhartwan | DEHRADUN
‘Tourists attracted to native cuisine but more needs to be done to popularise it’
Though restaurants and cafes selling the ususal Indian, Chinese and continental dishes are common, eateries serving traditional Pahadi cuisine are increasing in number with customers, especially tourists enjoying the traditional food of Uttarakhand which provides a tasty and healthy alternative to the usual dishes served in restaurants and hotels.
Pahadi House restaurant worker Vivek said, “Customers who are tourists mostly prefer Pahadi food because of the fact that they want to explore new cuisine of Uttarakhand while the regular and local customers tend to prefer north Indian and south Indian cuisine.”
Desi Chula owner Surendra Anthwal commented, “We have been serving Pahadi food since 2016. In the beginning our main focus was to serve Pahadi cuisine and with time we added few other food options in our menu because there are people who are still unaware of Pahadi food and prefer the usual food options like north Indian and Chinese. To popularise Pahadi food there should be a proper platform to advertise this organic and tasty food,” he suggested.
A college student Durgesh opined,“It is difficult for the youth to shift towards Pahadi food because it does not serve any alternative to the popular fast food and because of this youth generally give less preference to Pahadi food. This is sad because our Pahadi cuisine is a healthy food option to go for. These days the Garhwali cafe and restaurant owners have designed their places in such a manner that it has started to attract youth towards trying the Pahadi food options which are at times also served with a twist.”
