I would love to someday go to India and travel a bit. I'm just wondering what exactly is the deal with the street food? Is there some wisdom as to what street food you can trust and what you cannot? I have been told you really don't want to get sick in India.
I'm pretty sure a lot of the street food is beyond delicious and it is probably the cheapest way to eat in India, but how do you gauge the safety of Indian street food?
Indian food is irresistible and street food is even more. The spicy, tangy, and sweet flavors just explodes in your mouth. And the versatility of Indian food is unmatched. Each region in India has something deliciously different to offer. I am sure you will find endless food delicacies in India and the best hospitality you ever had.
However your concern about cleanliness and hygiene is valid. Someone newly introduced to Indian food should take precautions.I would suggest few tips which I personally do when I visit India to ensure I stay fit to enjoy my trip.
AND DO ENJOY INDIA!
Any new country will present your body with new and exciting microorganisms it needs to get used to. My first week in the US was miserable because I didn't expect it, and my first week in India was manageable, because I knew what was coming. The only country I didn't have any issues in was Japan.
The key is to gradually acclimatize yourself and manage exposure. For me, that meant bottled water during the first train ride, and only switching to tap water once I was checked into a hotel room with ready access to a toilet that no one would object to if I stayed there for a while.
The same for street food: venturing out of a hotel room to try things in the vicinity works well, trying stuff in transit between cities, not so much.
After a week or so, you should be used to it, but you might need to repeat this if you travel longer distances. During my second trip, I had no issues refilling my water bottle from the tap at train stations or buying food from mobile vendors there.
You should always have a water bottle with you, and it is a good idea to carry a small bottle of liquid soap -- public toilets generally don't have any.
Other than that, bring a few packs of electrolytes, because that is what you are going to be missing if you get diarrhea for any reason, and go with paracetamol instead of aspirin for headaches if you're in the malaria risk latitudes (Delhi is pretty much in the center of that band, and that is likely your port of entry).
I have been to India twice in the past and both times kept eating street food with no issues. While food in hotel restaurants was good, it was not even close compared to street food I would buy from a cart across the road from the hotel.
Note that I am used to Indian food and very spicy foods in general. I can eat raw green chilis without much issue (which I did to the amazement of locals in Hassan in Karnathaka where I attended a local wedding).
While India is huge and different areas have different traditions and different foods, I had a simple rule when considering street food: only buy from places/carts where lots of locals buy. For example, with two carts on a street, if many locals are buying from one and very few from the other, I would buy from the one with lots of customers. The other one may be even better, but I certainly didn't want to risk it.
Over two trips, I spent a total of about a month in India (Andra Pradesh and Karnathaka) - and never had any problems.
There is one easy way how to tell what to eat and what to avoid - see what locals do. If you see street food with lots of locals around, it's probably fine. If there are none, they probably have a bad experience with the place, so you should stay away as well.
You should also have proper vaccination when travelling - standard vaccination that is compulsory / recommended in your home country, as well as some "travel" vaccination (like typhoid fever, hepatitis A, rabies or so). Check with your travel clinic for details, as it depends on the destination.
Carry some hand disinfectant and have travel first aid kit on the hostel with activated carbon (this is not really a precaution, but it can help with consequences of bad food).
As for the tap water - don't bother trying to "acclimatize" unless you are going to stay in the country long-term. Instead drink bottled water or carry a water filter (I prefer Sawyer) and filter the tap water before drinking it. And avoid ice in your drinks.
One thing to remark is that people respond different ways to new organisms, so that there's a good chance that even if you follow the best practices described here, you'll become ill. It's really just the luck of the draw.
A travel doctor told me once that she prefers street food to a restaurant, since she can see the food being prepared and can get a sense for the food safety herself. That's reasonable advice, of course, but I would again emphasize the roll of chance.
The best thing is to maintain a good attitude and have a reasonable stock of medicines for traveller's diarrhea—which are probably best to buy in India, where they will be much cheaper.
Those qualifications aside, I really can't recommend the canteen at the New Delhi Zoo. ;-)
Food safety: Clean it, peel it or cook it.
Cleaning it is obviously not an option in this case. (And remember that tap water is itself contaminated and thus can't clean.)
Likewise, peeling is not an option.
Thus, cooking is the only way to ensure safety--only eat things which are freshly cooked and beware of possible contamination from utensils and dishes. Food safety in such places is difficult!
One note, India is HUGE. Asking about "food in India" is like asking about "food in Europe" - Scotland is incredibly different from Italy, from Sweden, from Portugal.
Secondly note that India and Indians have incredibly higher standards about food than Western countries...
Indians and India assume that what we eat in the West is bizarre, shocking.
The fact that in the West we eat frozen meat is seen as some sort of desperation measure.
The fact that in the West we eat non-frozen meat that has sat around for days or longer in a supermarket fridge is seen as sickening, putrid. Only the freshest imaginable meat is considered worth eating in India.
Bread, obviously, is to India what surfing is to Hawaii or gravity it to a neutron star - bread in the West is impossibly bad.
The unbelievable amount of additives, chemicals, and artificial ingredients which are part of the Western world is seen as astonishing, incomprehensible.
For vegetables and so on, the concept of "Fresh" in the West is just sad, to any Indian from richest to poorest.
For world-travelled sophisticated Indians: As you know in the West we nowadays have a "fad" for localvore-ism, whole food -ism, clean food -ism. Which is an admirable micro-step in the right direction. Indians smile at this in the same way that NASA would smile at Tonga's space program.
On the ground, Indians don't really care for restaurants: because home cooking is just so incredibly, universally good. It's interesting that in the West, "foodie" culture is about restaurants! famous chefs! etc. In India a restaurant is more of an emergency measure if there's something wrong at home.
Regarding the first paragraph, I can only address Mumbai. Where I lived for years.
Having spent a lifetime gluttonizing myself at all the world's "famous" whatever restaurants, of the top 10 most amazing, most wonderful, things I have ever had, fully four (if not more) were street food in Mumbai.
Regarding cleanliness etc, maybe I was just incredibly lucky what "streets" I was on but I have never seen or eaten anything other than utterly spotless, fastidious, amazingly healthy street food in Mumbai. It's just that good.
(Comparing the impeccably, fanatically, prepared hyper-fresh, ultra-crafted, street food of India to the bizarre food-like products and conditions that you find in Western fast food outlets, would be ridiculous.)
Bon appetit.
