~370 cal · 7g protein · 56g carbs · 15g fat (estimated, per serving)
🍽️
Red vegetable bhaji with buttered toasted buns and onion
🇮🇳 Maharashtra (Mumbai)
Pav bhaji fed Bombay’s textile-mill workers in the 1850s — a fast, cheap mash of whatever vegetables the day left over. Today the flat-top griddles of Juhu Beach turn it out by the tonne, with butter applied at quantities best not discussed.
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Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
Ingredients
Serves 4 —
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3 potatoes, boiled
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3 cups total cauliflower + peas + carrots, chopped
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3 tomatoes, chopped
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1 red bell pepper, diced
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2 onions, diced (plus extra raw, to serve)
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2.5 tbsp pav bhaji masala
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2 tbsp ginger + garlic paste
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5 tbsp — the street stalls use more butter
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8 pav (soft buns)
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1 lime
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a handful cilantro
Instructions
1
Boil the cauliflower, peas, and carrots until soft; mash roughly with the potatoes.
2
Fry the onions in half the butter; add ginger-garlic, then tomatoes and pepper, cooking down 8 minutes.
3
Add the masala and the mashed vegetables with a cup of water. Simmer and mash on the heat 10 minutes — the texture should be a rough, spoonable curry.
4
Split the pav and toast cut-side down on a buttered pan until golden.
5
Serve the bhaji with a butter pat on top, raw onion, lime, cilantro — and the pav for scooping, never cutlery.
Mumbai street-griddle tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers — know your destination
📍
Maharashtra (Mumbai). Mumbai’s beach stalls, where pav bhaji never sleeps.
🗺️
India. A subcontinent where every state is its own food country.
🌍
Asia. From street-cart woks to slow monastery kitchens.
The story behind this dish is up top — worth a read while the pot works.
👩🍳
Richard Moore & Kelsey Tucker
Recipes cooked, tested, and researched by the creators of Spin the Globe. How we build our recipes →
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