Beer and Indian street food: chaat, pav bhaji and momos

First, take it home

A practical note before the fun part. Drinking in public is not allowed in most of India. A chaat stall is not a licensed bar. Everything below assumes you have packed the food to eat at home, or you are at a licensed restaurant or taproom that serves street-style snacks. Many do now.

The good news is that street food travels reasonably well. Keep the pani, chutneys and sev separate until you eat. Pav bhaji reheats perfectly.

What street food asks of a beer

Street food rarely does one thing. A single papdi chaat has crisp fried wafers, cool curd, sweet tamarind chutney, sharp green chutney, chaat masala and sev. That is fat, acid, sugar, salt and heat in one spoonful.

Two beer qualities handle that best. The first is carbonation. Most lagers are packaged at around 2.5 volumes of CO2. A Belgian wit or a German wheat beer often sits higher, closer to 3 or above. That extra fizz scrubs fried oil and curd from the palate. The second is a little acidity of its own. A tart beer meets tamarind and lime on equal terms, where a sweet beer goes cloying and a bitter one goes metallic.

Serve these beers cold, but not so cold that they taste of nothing. Our guide to beer serving temperature explains why a wit or a sour shows more at 6 to 8 °C than straight from the coldest corner of the fridge.

Chaat: pani puri, papdi chaat and bhel

Pani puri (golgappa in the north, puchka in Kolkata) is mostly about the pani: tamarind, mint, coriander, black salt, cumin and green chilli. Pair it with a gose, a lightly salted sour wheat beer with coriander, or a Berliner weisse. The salt and sourness line up so closely that the beer tastes like part of the dish.

Papdi chaat and dahi puri bring curd, so a witbier is a better fit. Its soft body handles the dairy and its orange peel brightens the sweet chutney. Bhel puri, drier and crunchier, takes a crisp pilsner.

A fruited sour with mango or passion fruit is a fun experiment with any of these. Keep the sweetness in check or it will fight the tamarind.

Pav bhaji and vada pav

Mumbai's pav bhaji is mashed vegetables cooked with pav bhaji masala and a generous amount of butter, served with buttered, griddled pav, raw onion and lime. Butter is the main event. An amber lager or a Vienna lager works well here, with enough toasty malt to meet the browned butter and enough carbonation to cut it. A moderately bitter English pale ale is good too.

Vada pav is a fried potato dumpling in a soft bun with dry garlic chutney and fried green chillies. It is simpler food and wants a simpler beer: a cold, light lager or pilsner. The chillies argue against anything strongly hopped.

Momos and kathi rolls

Momos came to Indian streets from the Himalayan regions and the Northeast. Steamed ones are delicate. The heat comes almost entirely from the red chilli and garlic chutney on the side. A light, clean lager or a rice lager lets the filling show and keeps the chutney in check. Fried and tandoori momos have more going on and can take a helles or a Kölsch-style ale.

The Kolkata kathi roll, with egg-coated paratha around chicken or paneer tikka, onion, chilli and lime, is richer. A pale ale with moderate bitterness suits it. So does a saison, whose peppery dry finish handles the paratha's oil.

Chole bhature and the heavy hitters

Chole bhature is a big plate: spiced chickpeas, deep-fried bread and pickled onion. You want a beer that refreshes rather than adds weight. A pilsner or a crisp Dortmunder lager is right. Avoid strong, sweet beers, which make the meal feel twice its size.

One small brewhouse caution applies to all of this. Tart beers vary a lot. A kettle sour can be soft and lemony or sharp enough to strip enamel. Taste before you pour for the table.

Try a street food flight

The easiest way to learn this is to put three beers next to three snacks: a pilsner, a wit and a gose with pani puri, pav bhaji and momos. Take small pours, rotate and notice what each beer does to the chilli, the butter and the tamarind. Within one evening you will have firmer opinions than most beer menus.

Putting words to what you noticed is the harder part. It is also the part that improves fastest with training. Pairings are suggestions, not rules, so trust your own palate.

Common questions

What beer goes with pani puri?

A gose or a Berliner weisse. Their light salt and sourness match the tamarind and mint pani closely.

Which beer suits pav bhaji?

An amber or Vienna lager. The toasty malt meets the browned butter and the carbonation keeps the dish from feeling heavy.

What should I drink with spicy momo chutney?

A light, clean lager or rice lager with low bitterness. Hoppy beers make the chilli and garlic chutney feel hotter.