Samosa

Traveled into the Indian subcontinent from Central Asia and Persia between the 13th and 14th centuries — the Persian sanbosag is documented in 10th-century court records of the Abbasid caliphate, and Ibn Battuta described eating one (called sanbusak) at Muhammad bin Tughluq's Delhi court in 1334. The Indian version eventually swapped the original meat filling for spiced potato as the dish moved into vegetarian street-food territory.

Central Asian sambusa traveled to India with 13th-century Delhi Sultanate cooks. The pastry must be stretched and rested twice — the lamination, not just the filling, is what separates a great samosa from a mediocre one.

A heavy, palm-sized triangle with a thick crust that shatters along the seam. Inside: a dry crumble of potato, peas, ginger, green chili, cumin, and a faint sour edge from amchur (dried mango powder). Eaten dipped in tamarind chutney or mint-coriander chutney, sometimes both. The pastry should snap, not bend; if it folds when you press it, the dough was rolled too thin or fried at too low a temperature.

The crust uses maida (refined wheat) with a high ratio of fat (ghee or oil) worked in until the dough resembles wet sand — this is moyan, the technique that gives samosa its characteristic blistered, flaky shell. Frying happens in two stages: first at 130–140°C until the pastry sets and barely colors, then at 180°C to crisp and brown. Single-stage high-heat frying gives a tough, oil-soaked shell.