The interviews and reporting for this story were conducted in 2024.

At 72, Manju Kothari still fondly remembers her mother’s recipe for gondh ke ladoo. Gondh, a natural edible gum, is mixed with jaggery, flour and ghee to make this quintessentially Rajasthani winter sweet. “I make them, too,” Manju shares, “I learnt it from my mother. But the taste that she or my mother-in-law could bring out of these recipes, I can’t do the same.”

Manju, a native of Churu, Rajasthan, now calls Surat, Gujarat home. Despite her humble demeanour, her family recognises her as a culinary treasure trove. Her recipes, rooted in centuries-old traditions, are a testament to her cultural heritage. However, as time marches on, these age-old recipes risk fading into oblivion.

Founded by Dipali Khandelwal, a native of Jaipur, ‘The Kindness Meal’ seeks to preserve and revive these forgotten dishes by focusing on generational sharing. Dipali’s own journey with food is deeply rooted in her childhood, growing up in a large, joint family where food was a central part of their lives. “As far as I can remember, I was very fond of cooking, very fond of creating my own recipes,” Dipali tells The Better India.

“I grew up with a big family, so there was all this conversation, sharing and experimentation with food,” she says. With a grandfather who was particular about the quality of every single dish he made, down to the location of where the dates should come from, Dipali’s childhood was greatly informed by the food culture she saw around herself.

Dipali spent countless hours with Manju, listening to stories of the food she grew up with in Rajasthan. Manju shared the many recipes she had learned from her elders, explaining how she continues to make them today. These conversations gave Dipali invaluable insights into her field of research, with Manju becoming one of her greatest inspirations in her journey to preserve these forgotten dishes.

Why local dishes are disappearing in Rajasthan

For the past seven years, Dipali has been working in the field of art and cultural festival curation across the country. As this involves a lot of travelling and connecting with people at the grassroots, she ended up noticing a growing trend.

While urban areas were succumbing to the convenience of packaged and processed foods, rural communities were witnessing the erosion of their culinary traditions. “I once spoke to a woman who lived in the outskirts of Bikaner. She said she doesn’t feed her son bajre ki roti (flatbread made out of pearl millets) because he will eventually move to the city and if people see him eating that instead of a wheat chapati, they might make fun of him,” she shares.

As Western influences increasingly permeate local cultures,

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