When we think about famous food in Kerala, the first things that come to mind are coconut-rich curries, soft appams, steamed puttu, spicy fish curry, banana leaf Sadya, and sweet payasam. Kerala’s cuisine is shaped by its coastline, spice trade history, rice-based meals, coconut, tapioca, seafood, and regional traditions from Malabar, Central Kerala, and Travancore. Whether you love vegetarian meals, seafood, meat dishes, breakfast foods, or desserts, Kerala has something memorable for every traveller.
Rated as the world’s best breakfast by Travel & Leisure magazine, Kerala’s healthy breakfast is cooked with pure, fresh, natural, and seasonal local ingredients. Begin your day with Upma, Kadala Curry, Puttu, Idly, Idiyappam, and Appam. Appams are recommended with vegetable stew or meat/chicken stew and ordering breakfast is a pleasure for the tongue with dishes like Puttu.
Famous Food in Kerala to try on your visit
The guide gives you a glimpse into the top-rated traditional dishes of Kerala that you must try:
1. Kerala Sadya
🍃 Lunch 🍛 Main Dish
Kerala Sadya is one of the most famous traditional meals of Kerala, usually served on a banana leaf during Onam, Vishu, weddings, and other special occasions. This grand vegetarian feast includes rice, sambar, avial, thoran, olan, pachadi, pickles, pappadam, and payasam. With sweet, spicy, tangy, and savoury flavours served together, Sadya offers one of the best introductions to Kerala’s food culture.
ALSO SEE –Kerala Sadhya Guide-Dishes, Banana Leaf Etiquette & How to Eat It
2. Puttu and Kadala Curry
☀️ Breakfast
Puttu is usually eaten with banana, papadam, and kadala curry. Puttu is made by slowly adding water to ground rice until the correct texture is achieved. It is then spiced, formed, and steamed with layers of grated coconut and served hot for breakfast. Puttu is generally cooked in a metal puttu kutti vessel with two sections. The upper section holds the puttu and the lower section holds water — where the rice mixture is inserted with layers of grated coconut and steamed. Perforated lids separate the sections to allow the steam to pass between them. The best point to taste puttu, one of the must-try in Kerala’s famous foods is any of the tea shops in the villages of Kerala where it is served hot along with spicy kadala curry.
3. Banana Fritters or Pazham Pori
🍵 Snack
If we are talking about Kerala snacks, Pazham Pori deserves a special mention. Also known as banana fritters, this tea-time favourite is made by coating ripe bananas in a light batter and deep-frying them until golden and crisp. This appears in any list of famous food in Kerala
4. Appam with Stew
☀️ Breakfast 🌙 Dinner
Rice flour and coconut milk are two staple ingredients of Keralite dishes, and that’s how you get those thin, pancakey appams. The crispy edges of this dish contain a hint of sugar, just to cut through the tanginess of the stew. Now, stew, or ‘ishtu’ (as many natives call it), is a thick and saucy mix of coconut milk, cloves, shallots, and cinnamon. It also contains mango pieces and vegetables for an enhanced flavour.
Appam was recently ranked among 100 Best Rated Dishes with Coconut by Taste Atlas
5. Piddiyum Kozhiyum
☀️ Breakfast
This traditional Christian breakfast finds its origin in Central Kerala and is nothing but sweet coconut dumplings. Made from grated coconut and dipped in coconut milk, it is paired with spicy chicken curry for a balanced flavour.
Since piddiyum is a little tricky to prepare, not a lot of restaurants list it on their menu. You might have to search specifically to try it.
6. Chemmeen Curry
⏰ Any Time 🥗 Side Dish
Simply called the Kerala prawn curry, this staple dish of South India originated from the Malabar region. It is made from a mix of coconut milk, green chilli, fenugreek, fennel seeds, and black mustard. And of course, a special ingredient called ‘kudampuli’ for a touch of sourness.
Many people add raw mango, drumsticks, and marinated prawns in it for a spicy and tangy flavour.
ALSO SEE-The Rich Culture Of Kerala: Art Forms, Dance, Festivals, Food
7. Fish Moilee
🍃 Lunch 🌙 Dinner 🥗 Side Dish
Are you somebody who loves a good stewpot? Then fish moilee, a Syrian Christian delicacy, is a must-try at Keralan restaurants. The chefs prepare its curry in an earthen vessel (manchatti) and stew fish in a blend of coconut milk, green chillies, and spices. Tangy and rich in flavour, the moilee is slowly marinated in oil, spices, and lemon juice before being used in the curr.
8. Karimeen Pollichathu
🍃 Lunch 🌙 Dinner 🥗 Side Dish
Karimeen Pollichathu is one of Kerala’s most loved and famous dishes, where fresh fish is marinated with spices, wrapped in banana leaf, and slow-cooked to smoky perfection. For travellers visiting Kerala, it offers a delicious taste of local flavours, coastal traditions, and the warm hospitality that makes Kerala cuisine unforgettable. You may receive the dish along with rice or standalone, adding to the rich flavour of the meal.
9. Palada Payasam
🍮 Dessert
Another quintessential dish is the sweet rice kheer with palada (rice flakes and milk), and it is commonly cooked in Kerala homes during festivals. The traditional recipe includes rice ada (flakes), milk, ghee, and sugar. However, several variants are available to match your preference.
10. Elaneer Pudding
🍮 Dessert
This modern Keralite dessert is again a coconut-based delicacy that never fails to impress. It is a rich and flavourful pudding made from delicate and fresh coconuts. The chunks are mixed with condensed milk, coconut water, and powdered sugar for an enhanced taste. It is chilled for a few hours for setting before serving.
11. Parotta and beef ollarthiyathu
☀️ Breakfast ⏰ Any Time
For the longest time, cafes in Kerala used to serve Chicken 65 and parotta as a staple dish. However, its version of parotta and beef fry (ollarthiyathu) is equally rich in flavour and fulfilling. The parotta is similar to North India’s lachcha paratha but typically made from maida to get those thin, flaky layers. The beef main course is glazed with soft butter and mixed in a batter of roasted coconut, shallots, curry leaves, and traditional spices. If you aren’t a beef person, then you can stick to Chicken 65. The flavours will not be disappointing.
ALSO SEE-5 Best Restaurants in Kochi to enjoy Traditional Kerala Food
12. Dosa
☀️ Breakfast
Dosa is a fermented crepe or pancake made from rice batter and black lentils which is indigenous to and is a staple dish in the southern Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, and Andhra Pradesh as well as being popular in Sri Lanka. The constituent ingredients of rice and lentils mean it is gluten-free and contains protein. Most popular versions of dosa include Masala Dosa, Paper Dosa, and Mysore Masala Dosa.
13. Avial
🍃 Lunch 🥗 Side Dish
Avial or aviyal is a delicious mix of vegetables in a light, delicately spiced semi gravy with vegetables like carrots, drumsticks, potatoes, yard-long beans, pumpkin, and an endless list of garden-fresh veggies. and is usually served along with rice in any restaurant in Kerala. Aviyal is a regular dish during festivities in South India including weddings and festivals. When you prepare Aviyal, it is important to get the right balance of colour and that pronounced coconutty taste and is among the most popular vegetarian dishes in Kerala.
14. Malabar Biriyani
⏰ Any Time
There are various kinds of biryanis in India, However, biriyanis in the Malabar area from Kozhikode, Malappuram, Thalassery to Kasargod of Kerala is special and the recipe has crossed generations. This is yummy biriyani from Malabar is not spicy or fiery but comes with a small number of chillies and a single egg.
ALSO SEE – Biryani: A Dish That Steals Hearts and Satisfies Souls!
15. Kerala Fish Curry
🍃 Lunch 🌙 Dinner 🥗 Side Dish
Kerala Fish Curry is a basic fish curry recipe, but the flavours of cocoum and coconut milk take it to another level. This is one of the main traditional food of Kerala that is tasty with a fleshy white fish smeared with onion, tomatoes, garlic, green chillies, and coconut paste which is steamed, tempered, and served.
16. Naadan Beef Curry or Kerala Style Beef Curry
☀️ Breakfast 🥗 Side Dish
Beef curry cooked in Kerala Style has a mix of coconut and onions and the beef once cooked is generously coated with curry leaves, ginger-garlic paste, coconut, and mustard seeds. The dark hue of this dish reflects the depth of its tasty flavours that can emanate from tender beef.
Have you tried out any Kerala famous food items in a restaurant that you are fond of food in Kerala? Let us know through comments.
17. Kappa and Fish Curry
☀️ Breakfast
Kappa and Fish Curry is one of the most loved traditional food combinations in Kerala, especially in coastal regions. Kappa, or boiled tapioca, is cooked until soft and often mixed with grated coconut, curry leaves, and mild spices. It is served with spicy and tangy Kerala-style fish curry, usually flavoured with kudampuli, chilli, and coconut-based masala. This hearty dish beautifully represents Kerala’s love for seafood, simple ingredients, and bold local flavours.
How to eat food in Kerala?
The region is known for a variety of specific ingredients which make the Keralite food worth every bite.
A normal meal in Kerala may consist of
* Rice
* Indian bread (chappathi, roti, or appam)
* Side dishes (salad, papad, pickles)
* Main dishes (vegetables and/or meat)
* Sambar/ Rasam(a spicy and watery combination of vegetables)
Appam or Chappati is eaten first with some of the vegetable or meat dishes. The remaining vegetables or meat are then eaten along with the rice and sambar. The purpose of the side dishes is to add different flavours and textures to the food in Kerala and you should only eat small helpings of side dish
If we talk about the main components, you will find rice, beans, yam, banana, tapioca root, and ash gourd in many of the dishes. For non-vegetarians, a variety of seafood and meat is available, making every dish succulent and rich in flavours.
As for the spices, you will find most dishes have a specific flavour due to kodam puli, garcinia cambogia, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, and black pepper. And of course, all the basic spices are present to make the dishes tangy!
Tips for eating food in Kerala
- It’s clean and polite to wash your hands before you sit down to eat.
- Only eat with your right hand. The left hand is considered to be unclean as it’s reserved for functions associated with going to the toilet.
- Eat the bread (Chapati/ Appam) first with some of the vegetable or meat dishes, then eat the remaining vegetables or meat along with the rice and sambar or rasam. The purpose of the side dishes is to add different flavours and textures to the food, so you should have a small portion of any one of these after each bite of the main dishes.
- The most important thing is to sample each different dish separately, to allow its individual characteristics to be appreciated.
- Be careful with the amount of sambar/ rasam you pour onto the rice. Too much sambar will result in the rice becoming sloppy and it won’t hold together properly. Too little sambar and the rice will be sticky and tasteless.
- After eating, if you’re a guest in someone’s home, wait until everyone has finished then get up to wash your hands again to clean them.
From the festive Kerala Sadya and comforting Puttu with Kadala Curry to spicy Fish Curry, Malabar Biriyani, crispy Pazham Pori, and creamy Palada Payasam, the famous food in Kerala reflects the state’s love for coconut, rice, seafood, spices, and slow-cooked flavours. Whether you are visiting the backwaters, beaches, hill stations, or historic towns, these traditional Kerala dishes deserve a place on your food list.
Frequently Asked Questions About Food in Kerala
What is the most famous food in Kerala?
Kerala Sadya, Puttu and Kadala Curry, Appam with Stew, Fish Curry, Karimeen Pollichathu, Malabar Biriyani, and Palada Payasam are among the most famous foods in Kerala.
What is the main food of Kerala?
Rice is the staple food of Kerala. It is commonly eaten with sambar, rasam, vegetable curries, fish curry, meat dishes, pickles, and pappadam.
Which sweet is famous in Kerala?
Palada Payasam and Ada Pradhaman are two of the most famous sweets in Kerala, especially during festivals, weddings, and traditional Sadya meals.
Is Kerala food vegetarian or non-vegetarian?
Kerala food includes both vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes. Sadya, Avial, Erissery, and Appam with Vegetable Stew are popular vegetarian options, while Fish Curry, Fish Moilee, Chemmeen Curry, Beef Ularthiyathu, and Malabar Biriyani are popular non-vegetarian dishes.
What should tourists eat in Kerala?
Tourists should try Kerala Sadya, Puttu and Kadala Curry, Appam with Stew, Pazham Pori, Fish Moilee, Karimeen Pollichathu, Malabar Biriyani, Kappa and Fish Curry, and Palada Payasam.
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