Book excerpt: Rajasthan's cuisine has been enriched by diversity of influences. Not much grows in the arid wasteland of the desert but this has not cramped the culinary style of those who dwell there. They have imaginartively created myriad delicacies from lentils, dairy produce and what little vegetables are locally available. The present edition contains a new section on the Cuisine of Kotah contributed by Maharao Brijraj Singh and Maharani Uttara Devi of Kotah. Highly respected gourmets in their own right, the authors of this section have added vignettes of the history of Kotah with photographs of a picturesque landscape to augment their text.