Sadya, the typical Kerala feast served on a banana leaf, is a sumptous spread of rice and more than fourteen vegetable dishes - sambar, rasam, olan,kaalan, pachadi, kichadi, aviyal, thoran etc., pickle crisp pappadam and banana chips topped off wit payasam, the deliciously sweet desert cooked in milk.

The culinary skills of the various communities of Kerala has given us a cuisine of great variety. While Hindus specialise in delicious vegetarian food, the Muslims and Christians excel in non vegetarian cuisines - Pathiri and kozhi curry (Chicken), biriyani, fish dishes like meen pollichatbu, fish molee...

A typical Kerala breakfast may be puttu - rice powder and grated coconut steam cooked together, ildi and sambar, dosai and chutney, idiappam (string hoppers) - or appam - a kind of pancake made of rice edged with a crisp lacy frill, eaten with chicken or vegetable stew. Kanji (rice gruel) and payaru (green gram), kappa (cassava) and fish curry are traditional favourites.

Almost every dish prepared in Kerala has cocunut and spices added to in. Tender coconut water, 'the world's saftest natural soft drink', is a refreshing nutritious thirst quencher. The crunchy papadam, kozahalappam, achappam, cheeda, churuttu, banna and jack fruit chips can give french fries a run for their money any day.