7 ways chefs spotlight super flavorful Indian menu items

Fighting turkey dinner fatigue? The time between Thanksgiving and Christmas is ideal for a flavor disruption. Indian food, with its complex flavors, can be just as comforting as a casserole, just more exciting.

“I’ve always been fascinated with how well comfort foods translate cross-culturally,” says Van Sullivan, executive director, Faculty Student Association at Stony Brook University, where he recently taught a socially distanced Indian cooking class for students through the Teaching Kitchen program.

Sullivan learned about Indian food when he had “the incredible fortune to live in Queens, N.Y., the cultural crossroads of the United States,” he says, “where I was able to experience firsthand how to make traditional things like paneer and then add them to the traditions of my own culinary footprint.”

At Stony Brook, the campus celebrated Diwali, the Indian festival of lights with music and menus, but there’s no reason to let the inspiration stop there. Here are ideas from Stony Brook and other onsite food service operations on Indian food that’s super interesting.

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