Bowled over by Bohra cuisine

Munaf Kapadia narrates the story of his successful run as the ‘chief eating officer’ of a food tech start-up that’s making the Bohra community and cuisine proud

Munaf Kapadia

In 2014, my mother and I went out on a limb and decided to do something all good cooks fantasise about doing — testing whether people would pay to eat a home-cooked meal prepared by them. I am no cook but my mother Nafisa Kapadia is a fantastic one. And the food she prepares isn’t available in any restaurant or menu in the country.

We belong to the Dawoodi Bohra community — a small subsect of Islam with a diaspora in Africa, the US, UK, Yemen, South East Asia and Europe. Dawoodi Bohras migrated to India from Yemen in the 16th century, escaping persecution by the majoritarian rulers of the region. The first wave of refugees of this small but devout clan settled in Gujarat, India. Much like the Parsis, the Bohras (as we refer to ourselves) assimilated with the culture, cuisine and language of the people of Gujarat.

Bohra cuisine, as we know it today, is the result of Middle Eastern food intermingling with the vegetable, fruit, grain, spices and cooking style of Gujarat and Rajasthan. Peculiar as this sounds, ask anyone that has eaten my mother’s food at our home, it is an experience that leaves a lasting impression. We enjoy our dals, pulavs and sabzis as much as we do raan, cutlets and biryani. Bohra food is packed with flavour from the use of whole spices and dry fruit. Sumptuous and aromatic but not spicy in the least. Instead of a thaali, we eat from a thaal, a large metal plate that seats 7-8 people at once. Community dining is at the heart of the Bohra food culture. A fancy Bohra spread or even a simple one always starts with dessert. You read that right! We alternate courses to balance savoury with sweet a practice we’ve termed — kharaas-meethas.

Despite its unique and curious features, Bohra food has, for the most part, remained out of India’s regional food lexicon, like hundreds of other smaller regional cuisines. Our community is responsible for this lack of representation on the commercial dining scene.

Bohras are shrewd traders and businessmen, shopkeepers and shop owners. But as much as we love our food, taking it to the non-Bohra masses has not been a priority. My mother and grandmother like many other Bohra ladies are the custodians of Bohra cuisine.

Our weddings, religious and cultural functions are the only places in the world where Bohra food is prepared and consumed socially. No restaurants, cafes, pop-ups or dining experiences serving up Bohra fare existed while I was growing up. At home, I ate the best Bohra food there is in the city (in my humble opinion) and I couldn’t shake off the feeling that there was an opportunity here, right under our nose to do something for our community and cuisine.

I was working at Google, India in 2014 when I decided one weekend that my mother’s talent must be exploited. She and I put together a menu, I sent it out to a few friends and the rest is history. My mother and I called this joint venture The Bohri Kitchen. Every weekend from then on, we put out invitations on Facebook to Bohra-style home dining events which included eating 7 courses of home-cooked Bohra food from a thaal and the opportunity to dine with complete strangers. Bohra food became Mumbai famous and suddenly out of nowhere Bohra food was on the city’s F&B map.

My parents and I have been humbled by the response that the food has received. It spurred the entrepreneur in me to quit my full-time job and turn The Bohri Kitchen into a full-time business. We ventured into home delivery, catering, pop-ups at 5-star hotels and even set up a QSR at a popular food court in Mumbai. I can’t think of anything else that tells a story of people and places in the way that food does. And I am glad that my family and I are able to take the story of our community to the world.

(Munaf Kapadia is the author of How I Quit Google To Sell Samosas, published by Harper Collins India.)