Bengali cuisine

Bengali cooking is built on rice, river fish and mustard — and on an order of service that runs through the tastes.

A Bengali meal is served in an order of tastes: bitter first, then dal, then vegetables, fish, meat and something sweet or sour at the end. That is household routine rather than ceremony.

Mustard oil and ground mustard seed give Bengali food a pungency found neither in northern nor in southern Indian cooking.