New Delhi, Oct. 25 -- Food historian and anthropologist Dr Kurush Dalal loves a good butter chicken. But, to think that Punjabi food begins and ends with the creamy, tomato-based dish, or at best dal makhani, he points out, is a grave mistake.

It is with this intention of breaking stereotypes associated with Punjabi food that he and the team at Ikk Panjab in Delhi will host the Provenance Dinner later this week. The six-course tasting menu will trace the evolution of Punjabi cuisine, from the Indus Valley civilisation through invasions and till Partition.

If not for the five rivers flowing through undivided Punjab, the region would have been an arid landscape. "Punjabis, by sheer dint of hard work, have turned it into a land of grain, g...