Kachnar is the flower bud of the orchid tree (Bauhinia), a small deciduous tree of the Indian subcontinent whose plump, five-petalled buds are cooked as a vegetable across North India and Pakistan. Picked tight and green-pink before they open, the buds are stripped of their stamens and simmered into gravies (kachnar ki sabzi), stirred into meat curries, folded into gram-flour fritters, or packed into tangy oil pickles — a spring delicacy prized for its mild, faintly astringent, almost cabbage-like taste.