top twenty food blogs by indian bloggers – 2012

this post has been in the pipeline for more than a month now. i get a lot of emails from readers on how to start a blog and on photography too. i spend quite some time answering the emails that flood my inbox.

so i have decided to start a series on blogging where i will share my two cents of know-how as a blogger. wanted to start the series with an introduction of the top 20 indian food bloggers.  finally i decided that i have to complete this post and also introduce my readers to some of the popular indian blogs out there.

by profession i am a web developer and a seo expert. so the way i look at a website or a blog is much different than how a normal person does. i have some tools through which i can gauge the website or the blog. and trust me its not about gorgeous photography or a beautiful post…. it is about the elements in a website and its pages. the coding, the linking, the navigation and many more things.

as a blogger and also as a food blogger, what matters in the world of the internet is visitors. just imagine…. you have a beautifully designed blog with ooh la la photography and awesome posts and no one visits your blog. how will you feel?

as human beings we all need appreciation and encouragement….. right?

so the key is to start having visitors come to your blog. the number of visitors & page views you get…. this determines your blog or website worldwide rank.

so what do you do to get visitors? well there are many ways and this will require an exhaustive post and i will write about this sometime later.

one advice for blogging especially to new bloggers – be sincere and honest in your work as a blogger. this is one crucial element that will always help you in your life as well as in blogging. be passionate but at the same time be genuine and true.

the list of the top 20 indian food bloggers took me some time to research. in this list there are some blogs i have come across for the first time. they are the silent winners.

some of the blogs in this list are not about gorgeous photography or thoughtful or poetic posts. but the fact that these blogs are doing so well mean that they do get a lot of visitors & page views……  and that is a real fact.

some of these blogs must be getting approx 1o,ooo visitors everyday…. thats a huge number!!!

this top twenty food blog list is not a personal one. it is a logical and stats based list which is directly proportional to the number of visitors the blog gets. in the internet world this determines your global website rank.

i have filtered the  top twenty blogs by the alexa traffic rank which is the worldwide trusted global ranking system. it ranks websites as per the visits they get.

lesser the number of the alexa rank its means higher the ranking of the blog. eg google.com and facebook.com are ranked no 1 and 2 respectively. so this means that both google and facebook are the top two sites globally.

i have also correlated the twitter, facebook and rss readers of the blog and the results are again very logical. more the facebook and twitter networking or more the subscribers, the higher the visits and page views.

i have included food blogs by indian bloggers only. i have not included the food websites. websites are different from blogs. in a blog there is a personal touch and some real person is writing the blog. plus a blog is updated more or less frequently.

do keep in mind that the alexa rank is not a static rank and keeps on increasing or decreasing for a variety of reasons. but the fluctuation is not very high, it is just a little here and there, unless some major work has been done on or with the blog or if the blog is not updated at all.

so now beginning with the top twenty food blogs by indian bloggers….

1: sailusfood.com by sailaja gudivada – the most silent blogger of them all and the top most one. the queen… should i say. started in nov 2005 and still going strong. focusses on andhra cuisine, indian cuisine, baking and kiddie foods.
alexa rank – 58,303
facebook likes – 16,468
twitter followers – 600
rss readers – 9713

2: egglesscooking.com by madhuram- started in march 2008. all eggless baking recipes under one umbrella…. i have still not explored madhuram’s site. but  think i should.
alexa rank – 95,082
facebook- 5631
twitter – 239
rss readers – 3150

3: chefinyou.com by dhivya karthik also known as dk – a great place to know and learn many indian and world vegetarian and vegan recipes. some recipes you must have not even heard of. and dk also gives a step by step pics of the recipes which takes a lot of effort and work.  ask me…. to take pics while cooking, then to select the pics out of so many pics and than upload them on the post.
alexa rank – 97,640
rss readers – 7059
facebook – 39,180
twitter – 512

4: kirantarun.com by kiran tarun- a site new to me. has lifestyle, photography and food sections. worth a visit.
alexa rank – 1,10,199
facebook – 326
twitter – 14,555

5: cookingandme.com by nagalakshmi also known as nags – a senior blogger whom i really like. i know of her blog even before i started my own. have never commented – on nag’s blog… out of respect i generally don’t comment on a senior blogger’s blog… i have only commented till date on three senior bloggers’ blogs. i know how much effort and hard work a blogger, especially a food blogger has to put in to maintain and run a good quality blog. and i respect this…  plus seniority counts too for me.

her no nonsense approach to the food recipe is what i like and there are some excellent photos also to go along with. plus i just adore the recipe photos her amma sends so lovingly from kerala. from indian to asian to world cuisine plus some baking recipes and even photography tips too.
alexa rank – 1,18,423
facebook – 4579
rss readers – 3339

6: aayisrecipes.com by shilpa. the best for konkani and saraswath style food. another senior blogger and still going strong.
alexa rank – 1,46,492
facebook - 3970
twitter – 187
rss readers – 2227

7: rakskitchen.net by raks anand – yet another surprise for me coz i never heard of raks kitchen:-( she has amazing recipes and i yet have to check them out. south indian as well as regional indian vegetarian recipes with step by step pics.
alexa rank – 1,84,775
facebook - 1668
twitter – 51
rss readers -1658

8:spiceindiaonline.com by mullai- this site was completely new to me. south indian as well as regional indian cuisine.
alexa rank -  2,01,291
facebook – 561

9: sharmispassions.com by sharmi- another site which is good. nice photography and south indian as well as indian recipes.
alexa rank – 2,20,500
facebook- 1339
rss – 1390
twitter – 82

10: ecurry.com by soma rathore – a senior blogger blogging from 2008. some great bengali, rajasthani recipes along with indian food, baking with some gorgeous photographs. i just like her rustic photography. has vegetarian as well as non vegetarian recipes.
alexa rank – 2,45,261
facebook – 596
twitter – 993
rss readers – 738

11: spicytasty.com by shriya, nithu and arthi – had also never heard of spicytasty.com. many indian as well as international recipes.
alexa rank – 2,79,956
facebook – 1647 
rss readers- 926

12: whatsforlunchhoney.net by meeta k wolff- stunning photography and world cuisine. meeta is also a professional photographer and food stylist. so the blog has some gorgeous photos and great food. whenever i see meeta’s cake pics, i go bonkers – firstly i cannot make such a stunning cake and on top of that i cannot even make the stunning cake look more stunning.
alexa rank – 2,91,225
rss readers – 6101
twitter – 2549

13: mariasmenu.com by maria jose – a lot of kerala recipes here with some baking goodies too. the site has both vegetarian and non vegetarian recipes with nice pics.
alexa rank – 2,30,117
rss readers- 3791
facebook – 5134

14: purplefoodie.com by shaheen peerbhai – yet another site which was a surprise. the blog has a lot of recipes for baking goodies like cakes, breads, cookies et all. do check it out.
alexa rank - 248,880
facebook – 5894
twitter – 4475

15: veggiebelly.com by sala kannan – great vegetarian recipes and great snapshots. plus a peekaboo on sala’s culinary journeys in the us of a and other countries. no wonder the site is so popular.
alexa rank – 2,94,885
facebook - 5236
twitter – 2756

16: padhuskitchen.com by padhu – south indian as well as indian food. still have to check out padhu’s site. it is new to me too.
alexa rank – 3,03,452
rss – 1340
fb – 419
twitter – 18

17: vegrecipesofindia.com – here comes my site. nothing to say… am just going on…
alexa rank – 3,19,425
facebook – 1135
rss – 1847
twitter – 18

18: talimpu.com by raji – a neat clean site with just the recipes and their pics. has vegetarian recipes. indian as well as south indian food.
alexa rank – 379,846
facebook – 176

19: passionateaboutbaking.com by deeba rajpal – all about baking. so if you love baking then you should head over here. deeba has shared hundreds of baking recipes from bagels to buns to brownies… to sooooo many goodies. do check out. plus arty photographs too.
alexa rank: 3,86,870
rss – 636
twitter – 4081
fb – 2153

20: flavorsofmumbai.com by maria. goan, south indian and indian food. from beauty tips to food tips. all in one place.
alexa rank – 3,99,751
facebook – 370
rss readers- 194

apart from the above 20 food blogs, i have to mention 2 more blogs:

phamfatale.com by jacqueline pham – this site has a good alexa rank and i had to write about it. since i have covered food blogs by indian bloggers only, i did not include jacqueline’s site in the above list. but the site has a lot of indian food along with world food and veitnamese cuisine. great photographs too.
alexa rank: 1,57,884

chakali.blogspot.com by vaidehi –  google changed blogspot.com to blogspot.in. so when i checked vaidehi’s site with the extension of blospot.in, it gave me a different ranking than with blogspot.com. i still felt i need to mention about this site. has a lot of maharashtrian recipes along with indian food. site is both in marathi as well as english. a simple site with a key focus on maharashtrian food.
alexa rank: 2,97,675

enjoy the blog hoping and have fun

p.s: if you are a blogger and want to check your global rank, then just head over to alexa here. add your blog url and click on search.  alexa will display your blog’s global rank.