Kashmir’s Breads and Bakeries

By Arka Chakarborty

Every morning in the idyllic valley of Kashmir, a majority of localities, whether in rural or urban areas, are filled with the aroma of freshly baked breads as the local bakeries work to produce these soft and yummy delights for each household. A cup of traditional Kashmiri tea, be it Kahwa or Noon chai, is incomplete without a loaf of czot, a piece of lavasa or a couple of sweet kulchas accompanying it. The Kashmiris love their breads and unlike most of India, where ‘bread’ refers either to the home-cooked roti and paratha or the mass-produced English style bread, most Kashmiri bread items are produced in local bakeries called kandurs or kandurwans and the variety of the breads produced is astounding, to put it mildly. Kashmir boasts at least fifteen major types of locally produced breads, with each type exhibiting significant regional and local variations. Throughout the years, these breads have become an integral part of the culinary culture of Kashmir as well as the quotidian lifestyle of the common Kashmiri. The world of Kashmiri breads is vibrant, diverse and bright with different colors and shades; and the bakeries and bakers who produce them are fascinating.

The origins and journey of baking in Kashmir is a debated issue. Some believe that baking as a culinary art form came to Kashmir in the medieval period with Central Asian incursion and was popularized by its first sultans. Bakeries, according to this tradition, started emerging in earnest during the rule of Sultan Zain al-Abidin (r. 1420-1470 AD). Most food history enthusiasts, however, associate the art and business of baking in Kashmir with its princely and colonial history. The necessity for baked products and bakeries emerged, according to this tradition, in the twentieth century as a significant number of Europeans began spending long vacations in the valley. The first bakery was established here as late as the 1930s by Harry Nedous, an Englishman who had married a Gujjar woman and eventually became the father-in-law to NC founder Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah. Nedous had addressed the cravings of the European holiday-makers in Kashmir with bakery products which had a Western origin. He, therefore, only hired Europeans as cooks of his establishment. The European monopoly on the baking business in Kashmir lasted for a few decades before Kashmiris themselves started learning the art and innovating on their own. Kandurs or kandurwans started to emerge across different localities and selling cheap, fresh bread to Kashmiris at large. As baked goods started garnering a mass audience, some local families continued to serve the tastes of the elite. One such family was that of the Sofis. Muhammad Abdulla Sofi worked for Harry Nedous and learnt to bake from his experience there. He passed on this art to his son Ghulam Nabi Sofi, who furthered his knowledge from an institutional education in Delhi. Upon returning to Kashmir, the young Kashmiri baker started working for another important bakery in Kashmir, the Ahadoos bakery and confectionary. After about two decades of service there, he opened up his own shop in the Raghunath bazaar area of Jammu city known as the Jee Enn bakery in 1965. Ghulam Nabi Sofi was an innovator and quickly gained fame and a dedicated and vast customer base for his products. He was invited to ANUGA- the largest international food festival at the time- and brought home a gift of 5 kgs of white chocolate from a German company. With this white chocolate he invented the White Forest pastry which became an instant hit. He also introduced his customers in the valley to the famed Black Forest pastry. The whole business was moved to Srinagar five years after it was founded and continues to thrive under Nabi’s son Lateef Sofi.

While establishments like Nedous, Ahadoos and Jee Enn Bakery have always served an elite audience, most kandurs are local in nature and have modified and innovated on breads to create cheap options which, by now, have become an integral part of the Kashmiri psyche. Some of the most important indigenous or local breads produced in Kashmir’s neighborhood bakeries are, as follows:

Tsot or tschot or czot is a medium size, circular bread that is golden and has fingertip indentations on one side and is white and flat on the other. It is consumed generally with jam or butter. A larger variety is served with dollops of ghee or sheep fat and with side dishes at ceremonial occasions.

Lavasa is flat bread made of refined flour (maida). Generally thin in texture, it is consumed with jam or butter, but can also be wrapped around kebabs or other meat-based dishes like masala tschot.

Tsochwor or tilvor is a bagel-shaped, slightly hard golden colored bread with sesame seeds sprinkled on top which is generally consumed with butter and noon chai or pink tea as an afternoon snack.

Unlike the north Indian Kulcha which is eaten as a part of a main course, the Kashmiri Kulchas are palm-sized crispy biscuit or cookie-like breads sprinkled on top with poppy seeds. There are two variants of this popular snack- mith (sweet) and namkeen (salty). Both are excellent as evening snacks accompanied by milk kahwa. The namkeen kulcha is decorated with a peanut or an almond being placed on top as well as poppy seeds and is generally consumed on special occasions like Eid. The sweet variant, also known as khatai or kandi kulcha is slightly larger than its salty cousin and is accompanied by kounge kahwa.

Bakerkhani or bakrkhani or baqirkhani is layered bread which is prepared by repeatedly stretching the dough and dousing it with generous scoops of ghee and cooking it thereafter in a tandoor till it is crispy. Generally, this is served as an accompaniment of a main course.

Prepared from corn flour, the makai woer is a small, soft, round bread of around three inches diameter and six inches circumference with the upper half sprinkled with sesame seeds or poppy seeds. This is served as a part of an evening meal.

Sheermal is a dry, slightly sweet yellowish brown bread made of flour, date flavored milk and sugar among other ingredients. It is covered by sesame seeds on top. Sheermal is one of the more famous varieties of Kashmiri bread as it has spread to cities like Delhi, Hyderabad and Lucknow.

Makai czot is round, soft bread made of corn flour and baked on a pan (tawa) instead of a

tandoor. It is consumed in Kashmir and parts of Pakistan.

Made of rice flour, the tomla czot is flat bread baked on a pan and served with noon chai.

Phulke is the local name for chapattis or rotis made of whole wheat flour and salt (optional)

which is made using slat skillets.

Aab czot is a type of pancake made with fermented rice and has a preparation method and taste highly reminiscent of the South Indian delicacy known as dosa. It is served with noon chai.

Porathe is a huge flat bread made of maida and baked in an iron griddle and is similar to the north Indian poori but about seven times in size. It is generally sold near Sufi shrines and served with halwa. An average porathe weighs about 1 kg and is enough for an entire family.

Roth or Roath is spongy, cake-like bread baked in tandoor and topped with dry fruits. Preferred mostly Kashmiri Pandits, this is a bread that mainly features in special occasions.

Katlam is in many ways similar to bakerkhani. It has two variants, one being thick, hard and scone-like and the other thin, crispy and softer to bite into than its thicker counterpart.

Whether a tradition with medieval origins or a colonial one, it is clear that baking and baked products in Kashmir have ingrained themselves in the valley’s social and cultural fabric to the point where they have carved out a space for them in the local rituals. It is, for example, customary for people to celebrate any good occasion with roth or send trays of large bakerkhanis to their in-laws’ houses along with platters of chicken dishes to celebrate occasions like child- birth and engagements. Kandurs or kandurwans also serve as the chief social hub of local communities as people gather there to discuss issues ranging from petty gossip to national political, social and cultural problems. This rather unique cultural and social integration of bread products, when compared to other Indian regions, can be partially explained with Kashmir’s terrain and climate. Until recently, the harsh winters of the hilly region of Kashmir rendered communication systems wholly non-functional, with telephone towers being damaged by the snow and with no one to repair them since the roads too are blocked by the same. Areas like the Gurez valley suffered even more as the seasonal breakdown of transport meant the end of food supply from outside for a few months. In situations like these, the neighborhood kandurs or kandurwans became a source of life and sustenance for many localities. As bread remains the only available food, many remote households can be seen stocking up on cheaper varieties to use them either as quick snacks or whole meals during the trying winter months.

The twenty-first century has ushered in an era of transformation for Kashmir’s baking industry. On the one hand, the rapid improvement of communication and transportation systems and the arrival of the internet have led to the Kashmiri youth being more connected with the world at large, resulting in the development of non-local tastes at least among the urban youth. Establishments like ‘Just Baked’ are cropping up in the valley’s urban centers which aim to reach European standards in terms of baking and cater to this new audience, thereby joining the ranks of Ahadoos and Jee Enn Bakery. On the other hand, many local small kandurs are struggling to make ends meet as the price of the most basic ingredients for breads are reaching sky-high prices. The resultant price hike in regular bread products like czochwor may lead to the loss of their appeal to the masses. While local kandurs are struggling to exist, the emergence of the internet as a revolutionary communication tool and its popularization among the valley’s youth has led to the development of ‘home baking’ as a new entrepreneurial venture for many who, thanks to the incredible expansion and democratization of knowledge regarding baking, are honing their skills and producing products at prices which are blurring the boundaries between the mass market and the elite market. While most bakeries earlier were hereditary establishments, new entrepreneurs and co-operatives are taking the industry in the valley by storm. Still others are introducing Kashmiri breads to cities as far as Mumbai.

From humble local kandurwans to trendy cafes and restaurants, breads seem to have conquered the hearts and minds of Kashmiris. The climatic and topographic realities of the region seem to have played a role in the total integration of baking into the Kashmiri social and cultural life, but the ingenuity of the region’s first bakers who experimented and endeavored to successfully make baked goods accessible to all cannot be emphasized enough. The Kashmiri baking industry in recent decades is going through a tremendous transition, the results of which will only become apparent in the coming years. It is certain, however, that sheermals and czots are less likely to leave Kashmiri tables no matter how many new varieties of cakes and pastries are introduced to their taste buds.