Pakora

Pakora (pronounced [pəkoʊɽaː]), also called pakoda, pakodi, or ponako, is a fried snack (fritter). Originally from India, it is found across South Asia.

Name

Etymology and spelling

The word pakoṛā is derived from Sanskrit पक्ववट pakvavaṭa, a compound of pakva ('cooked') and vaṭa ('a small lump') or its derivative vaṭaka, 'a round cake made of pulse fried in ghee'.

Some divergence of transliteration may be noted in the third consonant in the word. The sound is the retroflex flap [ɽ], which is written in Hindi with the Devanagari letter ड़, and in Urdu with letter ڑ.

In International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration, however, the Hindi letter ड़ is transliterated as <ṛ>, popular or non-standard transliterations of Hindi use <d> for this sound, because etymologically, it derives from ड /ɖ/. The occurrence of this consonant in the word pakora has given rise to two common alternative spellings in English: pakoda, which reflects its etymology, and pakora, which reflects its phonology.

Regional names