Salads and Raitas

The traditional combination of dal, chawal, roti, and sabzi (lentils, rice, Indian bread, and vegetables) arrayed on an Indian thali—a serving platter—often includes two more types of dishes that serve as perfect accompaniments: fresh salads and yogurt relishes called raitas.

An Indian salad may be as simple as an onion thinly sliced into rings and sprinkled with salt and lemon juice that accompanies a heavy meat or chicken dish, a beet raita that brightens up a plate of burani, a roasted-eggplant yogurt used as a dip or spread, or cubes of spiced mango tossed with fresh coconut. Or it may be more complex, like the tandoori murgh salad, a lovely dish of shredded chicken and chopped vegetables that is one of my favorite “TV dinners.”