Generally South Indians especially Tamil people make this kind of lunch menu for marriage feast, guests, newly wedded couple / Maapilai virundhu or for festivals and occasions. According to Tamil people, serving food in Thalai Vazhai ilai is considered to be the way of showing love and respect towards our guests. Not just that, there is a traditional serving order that has to be maintained while keeping the dishes in banana leaf.
In Tirunelveli, our people give more importance to the serving order. Before I served this platter, I called my mom and asked her about the serving order but still I got confused on where to keep the pickle and kept it wrong I think. So I asked my mom again and wrote this post with corrections. There may be slight variations from the write up and picture. So please don’t get confused. I have divided this post into sections for easier understanding.
Hope this lunch menu post would help beginners especially newly wedded girls who are new to cooking. In the above platter, you can find (from left) Salt, Poriyal/Curry, Kootu, Thayir pachadi, Pickle, Rasam, Payasam, Curd, Banana,Vada, Rice, Dal, Sambar and Appalam. I have shared all these points based on my understanding and cooking style. Pardon me for mistakes :)
Check out my other state and some more Tamil nadu lunch recipes here .
Check out my other state and some more Tamil nadu lunch recipes here .
SERVING ORDER
First lets see how to place the banana leaf and serve the dishes in order.
- Always place the banana leaf such that the broader side of leaf should be on the right side of person who is going to eat.
- Start with salt on upper part left side of banana leaf (as shown in the pic). Some people may need more salt in dishes. Hence salt should be kept so that the person can add if its needed.
- Then serve the thayir pachadi on the right side upper part. Then comes kootu. Next to kootu keep poriyal, curry/roast. Here I served carrot thayir pachadi, keerai kootu and potato curry.
- Lastly keep the pickle varieties next to salt. Don’t forget to keep a tumbler of water.
- In the below part of banana leaf, keep the appalam, chips, vadam, masala vada or urad dal vada, Banana in the left side. Keep the rice in the middle of leaf and put some dal +ghee in one corner of rice. In Tirunelveli, people keep the dal in the right side and pour some ghee over it. In another corner of rice, add some sambar with vegetables.
- After the person finished eating dal rice, serve the sambar along with ghee if needed.
- Next to sambar, serve vathakuzhambu or more kuzhambu if you have prepared it.
- Then comes rasam. Before serving the curd, serve payasam. Some people wish to have in banana leaf and some prefer to have payasam in bowls. So serve it as per their wish.
- Lastly add the buttermilk / curd.
- After you finish eating, if its a marriage feast, close the banana leaf by pulling the upper part and cover the bottom part with it. It signifies that the person wishes to have this kind of food very often. Whereas if you have this food in a condolence meeting, then you should close the upper part with bottom part in the reverse manner.
South Indian Full Meals
South Indian lunch menu for guests - Banana leaf spread / Thalai vazhai ilai virundhu
Cuisine: Indian
Category: Lunch
Serves: Serves 4
Prep time: 45 Minutes
Cook time: 45 Minutes
Total time: 90 Minutes
INGREDIENTS
Vegetables to be chopped
For sambar
Other Ingredients
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HOW TO COOK A FEAST
I prepared this lunch menu for 4 adults + 1 kid. It took nearly 1 hour 30 minutes for me to finish the preparation. I started around 10 am and finished making all the dishes except rice at around 11.30 am. I used 2 pressure cookers, a small & a big one and 3 kadai. I always pressure cook the rice at the end while making feast so that you can serve the rice hot hot while eating. No worries even if sambar, rasam and other dishes are cold. In fact making these dishes earlier gives more taste. So the earlier you prepare, the better its taste would be ; ))
TIPS : Add a tbsp of ghee in the sambar, garnish with coriander leaves,check for salt and close the lid of sambar bowl.Addition of ghee & coriander leaves gives a nice aroma to the sambar.Similarly add a pinch of sugar and a tsp of ghee to rasam. It enhances the taste and gives a clear rasam while you serve.
If you want to finish the entire process within an hour, you can do some pre preparatory jobs in the previous day night. Finish the chopping works and refrigerate the vegetables, grated coconut and carrot in separate zip lock bags. Soak the dal for 4 hours and grind the vada batter. Mix onions,greens and refrigerate the batter too. Doing all these jobs will spare 30 minutes of your cooking time on feast day. So its your choice. Enjoy the South Indian Full Meals : ))
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LINKS FOR DISHES WITH CHOICE
Please check out my recipe index page for more sambar, rasam, kootu, poriyal and pachadi ideas.
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Try and Amaze your guests and family members with this South Indian Full Meals menu, get the applause !
