Local Food in Pune

Pune's food splits between traditional Maharashtrian cooking — which is well represented here in a way it isn't in most Indian cities — and a modern café and restaurant scene driven by students and IT workers.

Maharashtrian staples:

1. Misal pav — Pune's signature dish. A spicy sprouted-bean curry topped with farsan (crunchy savoury mix), onion and coriander, served with bread rolls. Intensely spicy in its traditional form. Several long-running establishments in Pune are famous for it, and the "Puneri misal" style is distinctive.
2. Vada pav — Maharashtra's ubiquitous street snack: spiced potato fritter in a bread roll with chutneys
3. Pav bhaji — mashed spiced vegetables with buttered rolls
4. Bhakri — coarse flatbread of jowar or bajra, the rural Maharashtrian staple, usually with pithla (a gram-flour curry) or thecha (chilli-garlic relish)
5. Puran poli — sweet flatbread stuffed with jaggery and lentil paste, made at festivals
6. Thalipeeth — multigrain savoury flatbread, typically eaten at breakfast
7. Sabudana khichdi and vada — tapioca dishes traditionally eaten during fasts, now everyday food
8. Modak — steamed rice-flour dumplings with coconut and jaggery, associated with Ganesh Chaturthi

Maharashtrian thali. Several restaurants serve a full traditional thali, which is the most efficient way to try the range. The Kolhapuri and Malvani variants are spicier and include excellent non-vegetarian options — Kolhapuri mutton in particular.

Bakarwadi — Pune's most famous snack export, a tightly rolled spiral of spiced gram-flour dough, deep-fried. Chitale Bandhu is the institution.

Café culture. Pune has an unusually strong café scene for an Indian city, concentrated in Koregaon Park, Deccan, Baner and Aundh — specialty coffee, bakeries and all-day dining. The student population around FC Road supports a lot of cheap, good eating.

Irani cafés in Camp — A handful of the old Irani establishments survive in the cantonment area, serving bun maska, chai and keema. Fewer than Mumbai's, but atmospheric.

German Bakery, Koregaon Park — A long-running Pune landmark that became internationally known through the backpacker and Osho scene.

Craft beer. Pune has a substantial microbrewery culture, particularly in the western suburbs — among the best in India for locally brewed beer.

Street food areas — FC Road, JM Road and the lanes around Tulshibaug for chaat, misal and snacks.