THE nicest thing to have been said about the eating habits of this holy city, is that nobody goes to sleep hungry in Amritsar. Not with the Golden Temple and its Guru Ram Das Langar there that feeds upto 70,000 every day free of cost and is able to go upto 200,000 if need be. But that's the beauty of the city.

The people can afford a lifestyle of eating out every night. And they do. The done thing for them is to call for food from out and have it with their rotis, parathas and dals at home. This is street food. Not exactly what Punjabi Amritsari cuisine is all about. But there is a cuisine that is peculiar to Amritsar. And it is a cuisine that is rich in food and of rich food; the richness coming from Mughlai influences of Afghanistan and Pakistan, which are nearby, and of an abundance of milk and dairy products which are channelled into the cuisine in the form of cream, desi ghee and butter. The food is rich, but it is also robust and earthy as well.

The Punjabis are hearty eaters, they are a vigorous people, fond of eating, working hard and merry-making. They are indomitable and spirited and have acquired the reputation for being the greatest foodies of India. Their food preparations, big cookery book writers have said, are like the people themselves: full of zest, and tantalising, tasty and nutritious as well. For instance, their mornings begin with thick parathas and kulchas stuffed with potato and vegetables and eaten with butter or spicy chana that has been cooked in flavoured curries of clove and cardamom. This is standard fare for them, the more desi ghee, the more butter used on the parathas and kulchas, the better it tastes. And they will wash this meal down with huge tankards of lassi or creamy buttermilk. But not without first having a half kilo of hot and sweet jelebis dripping with syrup. It is said that the incidence of heart disease in India is highest in Punjab, and in Punjab, yes, Amritsar has the highest rate of the killer disease.

But nobody is worried about ill-health and disease in this holy city. Not when there is tandoori cooking to be revelled in, one of the most popular cuisines of the world. Huge earthen ovens half-buried in the ground and made red hot with coal fires at the bottom. Into which go marinated meats, chicken, fish, paneer, rotis, naans, to come out crisp and sumptuous. The world of fine dining restaurants has learnt much from Punjabi cooking and the Britain has gone as far as to acknowledge the Punjabi Chicken Tikka Masala as its national dish!

The basic foods in Amritsar are chicken and mutton. There is no beef and no pork on the Punjabi's menu in Amritsar. There is fish, however, and the fish comes from the rivers that flow into the city and which are outside. These are the Vyas and the Sutlej. There is also the Hari Ke Patan lake in Amritsar and there are plenty of fish farms. Sole is King in Amritsar. And there is also the Singhada. But look at what the enterprising Punjabis did with this limited produce. They created a signature dish for the city with the Sole and called it Fish Amritsari.

Winter is the season to be in Amritsar. The harvests are in. The weather is inclement. The paddy fields are ready with Basmati rice and the mustard greens are in full bloom. It is the season for the state delicacy. Sarson Ka Saag and Makkai Di Roti. Mustard greens are cooked in earthen pots with spicy and hot green chillies, ginger and garlic, and this is had with corn rotis on which huge blobs of fresh butter are generously dabbed. The Punjabis of Amritsar are also fond of Baingan Ka Bhartha, Aloo Wadi, Mutter Paneer, Chana, Rajma-Chawal, and plenty of lentils. To help the cuisine along further, the soil, climate and geographical position of Amritsar supplies it with rich produce and helps the Punjabi to make food that can be termed as gastronomic in description.

Their cooking is done with garam masala, green and black cardamom, bay leaf, black peppercorns, cinnamon, curry leaves, cloves, nutmeg. They use plenty of green and red chilli, in raw form, powder and paste, to bring a bite to their food. And they are fond of ginger and garlic as well. Mustard oil is a big cooking medium. They have few flavouring agents for their cuisine and amchur powder and chaat masala powder, both available in commercial preparations, are the main things.

If breakfast is such a production number, then lunch is had outdoors by most people of Amritsar. The working class, especially, will simply not hear of bringing packed lunch from home. They have it off the streets in their lunch hour. From the small stalls set up by food hawkers and from malls and shops. Dhabas are another indulgence in Amritsar and almost does lunch or dinner at some time at a dhaba. The dhabas have also introduced to the rest of the country, and especially to those gourmet cities that live on rice, the culture of breads such as the tandoori roti, the stuffed paratha and the naan.

Unfortunately, while street food in Amritsar is amongst the finest in the country, the city's actual cuisine has taken a bit of a beating. It is not even so freely available at people's homes, unless, tradition demands that a typical Punjabi banquet be laid out... then all stops are pulled out. In this regard, the city is fortunate to have the Hotel Ritz Plaza on Mall Road in which the restaurant Ranjit's offers as close an authentic Amritsari meal as you may find anywhere in the city. The hotel's proprietor, Ajit Mehra, is a major foodie himself, and it his through his endeavour, and the efforts of his general manager, Pradeep Kumar Vaid, and the chefs, Rajeev Thakur and Kunwar Singh Rawat, that the cuisine is not just surving, but doing well for itself here.

Ranjit's menu is multi-cuisine, but there is a strong influence of Amritsari Punjabi food on it too; and besides, all that the chefs need is a little encouragement to turn out a banquet of the amazing cuisine. From the tikkas of fish, murgh, paneer and mushroom, to the main courses of Methi Macchi, the unique Machi Kela, where fish and banana are cooked together, Chicken Jahangiri, Mutton Roganjosh, Butter Chicken and Chicken Tikka Masala, they have a repertoire that is fairly amazing. Even the simple Sarson Ka Saag becomes a celebration here. And desserts are like being sinned against. Gajjar Halwa made from the dark, blood red carrots of the North Indian winter, Gulab Jamun and Kesari Phirni. These are common desserts you will find in the restaurants, on the menus of dhabas and even with street food vendors. For the Punjabi, three desserts are good enough. As long as he can eat them to his heart's content.