dhokla

The word dhokla (ઢોકળા) is Gujarati, most likely derived from an older form dhokali or dhokala found in Gujarati manuscripts from the 14th and 15th centuries, where it names a preparation of fermented lentil or chickpea batter cooked in a mold. The 12th-century Jain text Kalpasutra commentary mentions fermented pulse cakes among foods acceptable during partial observances, and by the 16th century the dish appears in Gujarati household records under a name close to its modern form. Abu'l-Fazl's Ain-i-Akbari of 1590 notes fermented chickpea preparations among the regional foods of Gujarat observed at the Mughal court, which places the dish and a close variant of its name in an imperial administrative document.

The fermentation that gives dhokla its spongy texture and sour edge is not incidental but the method itself. Raw chickpea flour or split chickpeas are soaked, ground, and left to ferment for eight to twelve hours with yogurt or lemon juice, producing lactic acid bacteria that leaven the batter without yeast. This process was understood and deployed in Gujarati kitchens by at least the 14th century. The addition of baking soda to accelerate the rise is a post-colonial modification; the original leavening was purely microbial and required an overnight wait.

Regional variation in dhokla follows Gujarat's internal geography of pulse farming. Khaman dhokla, made purely from chickpea flour, is from the Saurashtra region around Rajkot and Bhavnagar, where chickpeas were the dominant crop. The softer, more granular nylon khaman, so named for its silken texture, became the Ahmedabad variety in the 20th century. Rava dhokla substitutes semolina for chickpea flour. Each is called dhokla by its maker; the distinctions between them are local and debated with the seriousness of regional pride.

Dhokla crossed into international recognition through Gujarati emigrants who settled in East Africa and the UK from the 1960s onward. Packaged dhokla mixes appeared in Indian grocery stores in London and Leicester by the 1980s, and the snack entered mainstream British food media in the 2000s as a representative example of the wider Gujarati vegetarian tradition. Food scientists now study the fermented batter as a model for probiotic food engineering, and the lactic acid fermentation that gave a Jain kitchen its spongy morning snack is a documented subject in food biotechnology literature.