Indian food is one of the world’s most popular cuisines. Even as it has transformed the contemporary urban foodscape in this age of globalization, social scientists have paid scant attention to the phenomenon. The essays in this book explore the relationship between globalization and South Asia through food. Udipi restaurants, Indian food in colonial times, dum pukht cuisine, staples of the prepared food industry like Bangalore’s MTR Foods, Britain’s curry culture, Indian fast food in California—these and other distinctive aspects of South Asia’s food and culture are examined to gain new insights into subcontinental food and the ways in which it has influenced the world around us.
Krishnendu Ray is the Chair of the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies at NYU. Prior to that, he was a faculty member and Associate Dean at the Culinary Institute of America. He is the author of The Migrant’s Table (2004) and The Ethnic Restaurateur (2016). He is currently the President of the Association for the Study of Food and Society (ASFS). Tulasi Srinivas is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Emerson College, Boston. She is interested in comparative religion and food studies. She is the author of Winged Faith: Globalization and Religious Pluralism through the Sathya Sai Movement and the Cow in the Elevator: An Anthropology of Wonder. She has been a fellow at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs at Georgetown University and the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study at Harvard University.
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