A happier meeting of cultures produced the Goan cuisine. Alongside tandoori, rice and dal, Goan restaurants offer chourisso (pickled pig’s liver cooked in vinegar with tamarind) & vindalho (spicy pork). Chillies & cashew nuts were introduced by the Portuguese, as were plantains brought from African colonies; Goans use coconut sauces. You will find India’s best of beers& local wines (port being the most palatable).

Often music & dance accompany festivities, the Christian religions having mingled with traditional Indian practices of folk worship. During the carnivals towns & villages rock under wildest spirits. People dancing in the streets & Feni flows freely everywhere.