The staple food of Gaya is common to the rest of Bihar and Jharkhand. The other special preparations found in Gaya are typically traditional Bihari. The most popular of them include sattu, litti, pittha, pua, marua-ka-roti, bari-dal, sattu-ka-roti, baigan-bharta, sukhaota, etc.

Sweets: Gaya has been the origin of several sweet delicacies popular in the whole of Bihar, Jharkhand and the rest of India. Tilkut, Kesaria Peda, Lai, Anarsa are the most popular sweets that bear the trademark of Gaya.

Tilkut being the most popular of them is prepared using til or sesame seeds (Sesamum Indicum) and jaggery or sugar. It is a seasonal (winter) sweet and only the karigars (workers) from Gaya are believed to impart the real taste of Tilkut. One can find Tilkuts carrying the label “Ramna, Gaya” even in far flung places like Kolkata and Delhi. Ramna and Tekari Road are the areas in the city where every other house is a Tilkut factory.

Kesaria peda is yet another delicious sweet prepared from khoya (solid milk cream) and kesar (saffron). The Chowk area of the city specializes in Kesaria Peda production.

There are several varieties of Lai available in Bihar, including Lai from Gaya. The main component of this Lai is posta dana or the poppy seeds. These posta danas are processed and mixed with koya and sugar to give rise to a disk shaped sweet.

Anarsa is also based on khoya, but is deep fried and processed with sugar. Anarsa comes in two shapes ‘thin disk’ and ’spherical’. The sweet is finally embedded with til(sesame) toppings.

These sweets are dry and hence easily pack gable, preserved, and transported, unlike the bengali sweets which are soaked in sugar syrups. There is a tradition among the residents to gift the visitors with these sweets when they depart, as a token of love.

Beside this in Gaya one should must try roadside eateries like Aloo ka Chaloo & Chaat. Aloo ka Chaloo is made up of boiled potatoes sprinkled with red chilly powder and jeera powder, salt and tamarind water. One can easily found such joints outside schools and colleges as it is favourite of kids and teenagers.

Snacks: The people of Gaya are fond of spicy-soury traditional snacks. There are certain snacks that are found only in Gaya. The most popular among them are Alu-Kachalu and Sabudana-Badam Bhoonja.

Alu-Kachalu is a wet and sour snack prepared from aloo (potato) and imli (tamarind) mixed with black salt, chilly powder, jeera (cumin seeds), etc. This snack is popular among the students returning from schools in the day time. One can find herds of thelas (vendor’s vehicle) standing outside the schools during the closing hours.

Sabudana-Badam Bhoonja is a dry snack that is unique to the Gaya city. It is a mixture of fried sabudana (sago) and fried badam (groundnut or moongfali is called badam in Bihar) along with salt (both white and black), chilly powder and jeera (cumin seeds) powder. The mobile bhoonja vendors shouting humorous slogans can be found in every bylane of the Gaya city during the twilight hours.