The Bloodline

Over the last two decades Khan and his family, partially based out of suburban Delhi and Srinagar, have travelled across the length and breadth of the country, cooking at festivals, introducing the elaborate Kashmiri cuisine to over-microwaved urban populations.

Last month, Khan and six of his main cooks stopped over at the JW Marriott in Mumbai for a Kashmiri food festival.

For about two weeks, four goat carcasses would arrive every morning at the hotel8217;s kitchens, hung curd lounged in corners, large cauldrons held blackish-red Kashmiri chillies and yakhni spluttered on the gas burners, while Khan8217;s stash of cockscomb flowers, pran and saffron steadily reduced. The only thing missing was the cold steel of machines8212;everything that left the kitchen was hand pounded, simmered for hours and measured by what Khan calls 8216;8216;andaaza8217;8217;.

So the lamb balls in the Gushtaba were factory-perfect; the saffron-laced Rogan Josh as smooth as silk, the cuts of meat tumbled into the mouth after arduous hours on the stove; and the Maas Palow was punctuated with flaky mutton ribs and spices.

They were the sort of creations that take a lifetime to master. They8217;ve been evolving in Khan8217;s genes for close to six centuries now. He traces his ancestry back to Timur8217;s invasion of Kashmir in the 15th century, and the following migration of the cooking class of Wazas who came to the heavenly state to cater to the royal appetite. 8216;8216;We came from Samarkhand and have been doing this for as long as any of us can remember,8217;8217; says 40-year-old Khan, who is now considered one of the best exponents of the cuisine in the country.

As you8217;d expect, he began with his father Khan Abdul Ahad Waza, when he was barely 15. But where most traditional Kashmiri Wazas have remained in the Valley, the Ahad family had its sights on the rest of the country. Their tiny family-run outfit did its first five-star promotion in 1983 at a property of the Oberoi hotels in Srinagar; since then they8217;ve worked across brands and cities, even catering to parties for high-flyers like the Singhania family and actor Sanjay Khan.

When Khan first began, he says he wasn8217;t very good. 8216;8216;My dad wanted me to join but when you8217;re young, khoon garam hota hain, and you are always wondering where should I go, what should I do?8217;8217; says Khan. But after waiting, watching and learning over years of missteps and corrections, Khan has now mastered over 100 dishes and says, 8216;8216;I don8217;t even realise when I8217;ve made 40 dishes in a day8217;8217;. Even though he concedes, 8216;8216;naab hath mein hain,8217;8217; measurements are a matter of feel, Khan8217;s family released a book titled Wazwaan8212;Traditional Kashmiri Cooking in 2001.

But despite the modern twists, Khan is unassuming and amiable; his tongue has a lavish touch of Urdu, his voice is quiet but unrelenting when he talks about the colour, origin, warmth and constitution of meat and other ingredients. He is the public face of the family, 8216;8216;My brothers prefer the choohla, lakdi and the way we8217;ve been cooking for years.8217;8217;

So it8217;s especially odd that Ahadsons should be a promoter of microwave cooking. But for Khan and his brothers8212;Sharif and Shafi, whether it8217;s canned Kashmiri food, made the good old way, without preservatives or colours; cutting down fat, or increasing the number of vegetarian dishes in their repertoire, it8217;s all about getting more people interested.

Next month, Khan will be at a festival in Bangalore, and after that the canned foods will get another addition to its present list of six. 8216;8216;Zindagi mein kuch bhi ek saath nahin karna chahiye,8217;8217; Never do too many things at once. After all, it takes time to get any recipe just right.