Google Doodle celebrates Pani Puri; Know its origin

Today's Google Doodle celebrates one of India's premiere street food, pani puri. For Indians, pani puri needs no introduction. It is a street food made of a crispy shell stuffed with potatoes, chickpeas, spices, or chillies and is served with flavoured waters. On this day in 2015, a restaurant in Indore, M.P, entered the World Record for serving the maximum 51 flavours of pani puri.

It is said that in Mahabharata, the newlywed Draupadi created pani puri when she was challenged to feed five men with scarce resources. With just some leftover aloo sabzi (potatoes and vegetables) and a small amount of wheat dough to work with, this is how Draupadi got creative. She filled small pieces of fried dough with the potato and vegetable mixture. This is how pani puri was created. In today's Google Doodle interactive game, users are supposed to help a street vendor team fill orders for pani puri. Choose the puris that match each customer's taste preference and quantity to make them happy.

Google Doodle celebrates Pani Puri

This chaat goes by different names, as many regional variations exist across India. In Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, pani puri is a bite-sized street food commonly filled with boiled chickpeas, a white pea mixture, and sprouts dipped in tangy and spicy pain. In the northern Indian states of Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir, and New Delhi, the potato and chickpea-filled treat dunked in jaljeera-flavoured water is called gol gappe/gappa. In West Bengal and parts of Bihar and Jharkhand, it is well known by the name puchkas or fuchkas; the key ingredient for this variety is tamarind pulp.