Food reflects a region’s unique lifestyle, heritage and geography. This holds true for Maharashtra, with its recipes from the coast and inland. From appetizers and snacks to five course meals; from desserts and juices to chutneys, jams and pickles; from preserved fruits and vegetables to herbal remedies and digestives; from season flavours to year round favourites, Marathi cooking is a fine and complex tradition.

Throughout India, however, there are but a handful of Marathi restaurants, so the cuisine is, for the most part, undiscovered. Although Marathi language cookbooks abound and have become bibles of the Maharashtrian kitchen, there are few in English. This book seeks to introduce a non-Marathi audience to the varied delights of a refined and healthy cuisine that is both learnt and adaptive to individual tastes.