Thali
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Thali (Hindi: थाली, meaning "plate"; IPA: [t̪ʰɑːliː]) is an Indian meal with contents varying from one regional cuisine to another. A thali is a selection of different dishes, usually served in small bowls on a round tray. The round tray is generally made with steel with multiple compartments. In North America people sometimes use plastic thalis because they are disposable. Typical dishes include rice, dhal, vegetables, chapati, papad, curd (yoghurt), small amounts of chutney or pickle, and a sweet dish to top it.
Restaurants typically offer a choice of vegetarian or meat-based thalis.
Depending on the restaurant or the region you are in, the thali consists of delicacies native to that region. The North Indian thali starts out with puris, chapatis (rotis), different vegetarian specialities(curries), usually a sweet, and other miscellaneous items. The South Indian thali comes with appams papad, rice delicacies and similar items from the North Indian.
In some restaurants, a thali may include "bottom-less" refills on all components of food; the idea is that one eats until fully satisfied. Such thalis are referred to as 'unlimited' thalis. In some places the term means that everything in the plate excepting a few items like the sweet preparation or dahi wada is open to unlimited helpings.
Thalis sometimes go even by the regional characteristic of the items they have. For example one may encounter Rajasthani thali or Gujarati thali. In Maharashtra the term 'rice plate' was (and still occasionally is) used for the concept of thali. At many places in India, the bread and the rice preparation are not served together in the thali. Typically, one finds the Indian bread being offered first and the waiter serves the rice subsequent to the consumption of bread, often in a separate bowl or dish.
As one moves geographically to the South, the emphasis gets shifted to the rice preparation especially from the point of view of quantity. One finds here places which offer exclusively rice in their thalis. The reverse, however, is not true anywhere in India. Rice, even if it is in a modest amount seems to be essential to the popular definition of thali in India. One does not term an exclusively bread offering as thali. But one is often given the option of asking for bread instead of rice at several places. Also there are arrangements especially in Northern and Northwestern India (in fact, even Pakistan and Afghanistan) where one is offered bread exclusively as a part of a meal. One encounters such arrangements especially at a dhaba.
