What Makes Undhiyu the Ultimate Gujarati Comfort Food?
Sumitra Nair digs deep into the roots of this winter delicacy from Gujarat and finds more than just warming vegetables hidden in its layers.
Undhiyu, a quintessential winter delicacy from Gujarat, is a vibrant medley of seasonal vegetables, tubers, and green garlic, layered and slow-cooked to perfection. Celebrated in both vegetarian and meaty variations, it’s a dish that warms hearts and brings communities together.
Winter is here, bringing with it a craving for hearty stews, soups, and robust preparations of meat and vegetables. Among the season’s most cherished dishes is undhiyu (or undhiyo), a traditional Gujarati delicacy synonymous with winter, enjoyed from the end of Diwali through February. Undhiyu is a celebration of seasonal produce, blending flavours in a vibrant medley.
Read: Why Undhiyu is a cult dish
Undhiyu is a treasured and popular winter specialty.
The dish’s name, as explained by culinary expert, writer, and consultant Rushina Munshaw Ghildiyal, derives from its serving style. “The preparation involves layering vegetables—longer-cooking tubers like yams and sweet potatoes go at the bottom, while faster-cooking ingredients like papdi (broad beans), French beans, and small brinjals are placed on top. Once cooked, the pot is inverted onto a plate for serving. The Gujarati word ‘undhu,’ meaning upside down, inspired the dish’s name,” she explains.
This colorful array of vegetables is more than just a treat for the taste buds—it’s packed with nutrients. “Winter produce offers antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals essential for boosting immunity and staying warm,” says Mumbai-based nutritionist Maithili Kelkar. “Tubers like purple yam and sweet potato are excellent sources of prebiotics and fiber, promoting gut health and providing antioxidants. Green garlic, a star ingredient in undhiyu, is a powerful antimicrobial with antiviral properties. Beans like snow peas and fava beans contribute B-complex vitamins and protein,” she elaborates.
Pinky Chandan Dixit, founder of Soam restaurant in Mumbai, shares fond memories of a similar dish from her childhood. “I grew up in Mahabaleshwar, where my aunt would prepare umbadiyu, a version popular in Gujarat’s Valsad region. She’d build a shed in her garden, light a fire, and layer the umbadiyu in a pot,” she reminisces. “To check if it was ready, she’d place a papdi on the lid, seal the pot with dough, and wait for the papdi to pop.”
While umbadiyu and undhiyu share similarities, the former features a distinct spice blend with carom seeds and crushed peanuts. Traditionally cooked in earthen pots by farmers along Valsad’s highways, umbadiyu is served with jowar rotla (sorghum flatbread), boiled corn on the cob, chaas (buttermilk), and occasionally kadi (a buttermilk-based chickpea curry curry tempered with mustard and cumin).
Umbadiyu and undhiyu vary slightly when it comes to the spices. Umbadiyu adds carom seeds and crushed peanuts to the marinade. It is always cooked in an earthen pot, mostly by farmers living near the highway on Valsad. It is traditionally served with jowar rotla (flatbread made from sorghum), boiled corn on cob, chaas and sometimes kadi (gravy made from buttermilk, chickpea flour, which is tempered with mustard and cumin seeds).
Mumbai’s Soam makes surti undhiyu, the most popular version of the dish. Photo credit: Jignesh Jhaveri
At Soam, the Surti version of undhiyu is served with puris and remains the most popular variant. “We source fresh ingredients like green garlic, beans, brinjals, sweet potatoes, and purple yam directly from farmers in Gujarat,” Dixit says. She adds that preparing undhiyu is often a communal activity, with families coming together to chop vegetables, make green masala, and roll muthiyas (dumplings).
“I have vivid memories of helping my mother prepare undhiyu,” Rushina shares. “Everyone has a favorite component, be it brinjal, raw banana, or muthiyas, and there’s always plenty to go around. One of my most treasured moments was when my mother sent me five kilos of undhiyu from Mumbai to Dehradun during the pandemic.”
While the vegetarian Gujarati undhiyu dominates, meaty adaptations exist too. As you travel across Gujarat, the dish varies from region to region. The Kutchi-Bohra community adds mutton, and the Pathare-Prabhu community incorporates prawns into their recipes, both often served with rice.
The Pathare-Prabhu version, known as ghada, is a festive dish prepared during Makar Sankranti. It features local vegetables like water chestnuts, ripe rajeli bananas, kohlrabi, radishes, and beetroot, alongside tubers and beans. Certain varieties of papdi or beans native to North Konkan, like flat beans and french beans, are also added. Meats such as mutton, ghol fish, or black spotted croaker and prawns are seasoned with spices like asafoetida, cumin, red chili, garlic, and the Prabhu sambar powder, the community’s signature, that includes spices like cumin, coriander, chana dal, wheat, and mustard seeds.
“This dish embodies more than sustenance—it signifies togetherness,” says Soumitra Velkar, consultant and partner at Hungry Cat Kitchen, which specializes in Pathare-Prabhu cuisine. “The Pathare Prabhu Mahila Samaj in Khar prepares a communal ghada which is shared by many families, fostering bonds and cultural identity.”
The Kutchi-Bohra undhiyu, enhanced with mutton, maintains the essence of the vegetarian version, with onions and tomatoes tenderizing the meat. “We enjoy it with rice,” says Nafisa Kapadia, a Mumbai-based homemaker. “The meat adds warmth, perfect for winter.”
“There are at least two or three variations of undhiyu,” notes Dr. Kurush Dalal, archaeologist and culinary anthropologist. “Communities like the Parsis have their own version, adding chicken or other meats to the traditional masala and vegetables, including the tubers and the small brinjals.” According to him, there’s no particular reason to the addition of meat, except that each community cooks the dish in their own way. “These adaptations highlight how diverse communities celebrate winter produce.”
Traditionally, undhiyu and umbariyu were cooked by men in inverted pots buried in coal and ash pits, as they worked together on the farm.
“There’s no such thing as a ‘healthy’ undhiyu,” Dr. Dalal adds. “It is rich, drenched in sesame oil, and unapologetically indulgent—the perfect winter comfort food.”
A writer based in Kochi, Sumitra Nair enjoys writing stories in the intersections of women, politics, gender, social media, government, and entertainment. She has recently been hooked on to people watching and claims it to be a genuine sport.
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