Largest kitchen

Jagannath, the deity from whom we get the word juggernaut, receives offerings of food from the world’s largest kitchen.

You may have heard of the original juggernaut, the giant unstoppable wooden chariot that carries statues of the Hindu deities Jagannath, Balabhadra, and Subhadra. The juggernaut is part of the Shree Jagannath Temple in Puri, India, and that temple complex is also home to the largest kitchen in the world.

One of the traditions of the temple is to offer food to Jagannath every day. Fifty-six varieties of food, to be precise: saag, pakhaḷa, boondi, and 53 more. The collective term for these foods is Mahaprasad, and thousands of them are made every day.

To cook so much food, you need a big kitchen. Rosaghara is the kitchen, and there are none bigger. 300 rooms, 250 hearths, 600 chefs, and 400 assistants. It is said that their cooking is overseen by the goddess Mahalakshmi; mess something up and she’ll send a “shadow dog” to register her displeasure. If the dog shows up, everything has to be discarded and the cooking starts over from scratch.

• Jagannath Temple
• Mahaprasad
• Rosaghara