Bengali New Year Celebration: Pohela Boishakh Food

পহেলা বৈশাখের খাবার

The Bengali New Year or Noboborsho(নববষর্) is celebrated on April 14 each year. As we near the Bengali New Year eve, many many Bengalis around the world will be planning and preparing a delicious feast to share with family and friends. To help make your New Year’s Day brighter and more delicious, here I am with this wonderful roundup of traditional Bengali dishes. I hope you enjoy the delicious special meals on Noboborsho. If you don’t find a Pohela Boishakh recipe you are looking for, make sure to look at all the other traditional Bengali recipes here. You will also find authentic, traditional dessert inspiration for the Bengali New Year by clicking here.

Panta Vath and Hilsha

Traditionally, panta, leftover rice soaked in water and Ilish bhaaja a.k.a fried Hilsha with different kinds of bhorta is the food of choice to mark the Noboborsho festivities in Bangladesh. A hint of salt, lime and chili and most Bengalis will start salivating over this rice.

Dahi and Mishti

Mitha dahi is a popular dessert in the states of Odisha and Bangladesh. It is prepared by boiling milk until it is slightly thickened, sweetening it with sugar, either guda/gura (brown sugar) or khajuri guda/gura (date molasses), and allowing the milk to ferment overnight. Earthenware is always used as the container for making mitha dahi because the gradual evaporation of water through its porous walls not only further thickens the yoghurt, but also produces the right temperature for the growth of the culture. Very often the yoghurt is delicately seasoned with a pinch of elaichi(cardamom) for fragrance. Baked yogurt is a similar preparation in the west.

Pohela Boishakh(পহেলা বৈশাখ), the first day of the Bengali New Year is just a few days away. Noboborsho(নববর্ষ), another new year starting on April 14. It is time to celebrate the end of the Bengali year gone by and welcome the upcoming New Year. There is no better way to welcome the brand New Bengali year of 1422 than to prepare and serve traditional Bengali sweets a.k.a mishti? Bengali celebrations demands traditional Bengali desserts, so if you were looking for what sweets to make to celebrate Pohela Boishak (also referred as Poila Boishakh), then you are in luck! Whether you are serving an array of desserts or want to just pick one or two traditional Bengali sweets, you are sure to find the traditional Bengali/Bangladeshi dessert recipe you are looking for to ring in a sweet beginning for the new year from this list.