English
বাংলা
Famous products of Bangladesh
Every district has something it is known for — a sweet, a fruit, a weave, a craft. Here is where each comes from, when it is in season, how to tell the genuine article and how to buy it well.
GI product A Geographical Indication (GI) is a legal registration that ties a product's name to the place it comes from.
Fruit
- Ashwina mango of Chapainawabganj The last mango of the season, picked from July and sold into September
- Barishal amra (hog plum) The big, tangy hog plum of Barishal, Jhalokati and Pirojpur, July to October
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- Khirsapat mango of Chapainawabganj The fibreless early-summer mango that became Bangladesh's third GI product
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- Narsingdi Amritasagar banana The fragrant, thin-skinned sagar banana that Dhaka's nawabs are said to have favoured
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- Ishwardi litchi The juicy Bombai litchi of Pabna's Ishwardi, a short early-summer harvest
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- Sylhet satkora The thick-skinned wild citrus whose rind flavours Sylhet's beef curry
Fish
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Food
- Bhola buffalo-milk curd Raw buffalo milk, a clay pot and a night: the sour curd of island Bhola
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- Joypurhat latiraj loti Long, tender taro stolons from Panchbibi and the Joypurhat loti belt
- Manikganj hajari gur The crumbly, melt-in-the-mouth date-palm gur of Jhitka in Harirampur
- Rajshahi sweet betel leaf (mishti paan) The mild, sweet betel leaf grown in the shaded baroujs of Mohanpur and Bagmara
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- Chattogram bela biscuit The hard, twice-baked tea biscuit Chattogram has dunked for generations
- Khasia paan Betel leaf grown on forest trees in the Khasi villages of Moulvibazar's hills
- Maheshkhali betel leaf Soft, sweet paan from the hill slopes of Bangladesh's only hilly island
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- Pabna ghee Granular, nutty cow's-milk ghee from Bangladesh's dairy heartland
Crafts
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Sweets
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- Cumilla rasmalai Small chhena balls in thick, slow-reduced milk, from Monoharpur in Cumilla
- Gopalganj rasgolla White, round and only lightly sweet: the rasgolla of Gopalganj
- Jamurki sandesh of Mirzapur, Tangail A milk and gur sandesh from a roadside village on the Dhaka–Tangail highway
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- Meherpur sabitri sweet A dry, long-keeping milk sweet made by one Meherpur family since the 1860s
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- Sherpur chhanar payesh Tiny chhana pearls simmered in thickened milk, a Sherpur gift sweet since British times
- Chhanar jilapi A soft, ghee-fried coil of chhena in syrup, a pride of Gopalganj's sweet shops
- Domar sandesh Chhena and date-palm gur sandesh from Domar, Nilphamari's sweet town
- Gaibandha rasmanjari Tiny chhena balls in thick, reddish kheer: the sweet Gaibandha is known for
- Gournadi doi Thick clay-pot curd from Gournadi, on the road between Dhaka and Barishal
- Khamarpara doi Magura's celebrated sweet curd, named after a neighbourhood in Sreepur
- Khandal's sweets A rasgolla-style chhena sweet from a small market in Parshuram, Feni
- Kurigram buffalo-milk chomchom A dense char-country chomchom made from fresh buffalo-milk chhena
- Magura pera sandesh Magura town's own milk-and-sugar pera, a must at local weddings
- Mahasthan kotkoti Crunchy fried squares glazed in jaggery, sold at the gates of Mahasthangarh
- Meherpur ras kadam A round, juicy kadam-flower sweet from the family shop behind Meherpur's sabitri
- Naogaon pera sandesh Finger-shaped kheer sweets from the temple lanes of Kalitala, Naogaon
- Satkhira sandesh Fresh chhena sandesh from a dairy district, best in winter with nolen gur
- Taler bora Late-summer fritters of ripe palm pulp, a sweet Brahmanbaria counts among its own
Rice
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- Sherpur tulshimala rice The fine, fragrant Aman rice of the Garo hills foothills, Sherpur's "son-in-law rice"
- Chinigura rice The small, fragrant grain behind Bangladesh's polao, payesh and biryani
Textiles
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- Mirpur katan saree The silk wedding saree of Mirpur's Benarasi Palli
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- Tangail saree Soft, fine handloom sarees from the weaving villages of Tangail
