What to Eat in Kashmir: A Wazwan Guide for Travellers

How it works

You sit in fours around a trami, a large copper platter. Rice is served first, then course after course is placed in the platter and eaten with the fingers, from the side nearest you. There are seven traditional wazas who cook wazwan, and a proper wazwan is cooked by one of them over a full day.

The dishes worth knowing

• Rista — pounded mutton meatballs in a red gravy. The usual first meat course.
• Gushtaba — the final course. Large, soft meatballs in a white yoghurt gravy, and the mark of a good waza.
• Tabak maaz — ribs, slow-cooked then fried until crisp. Almost everyone's favourite.
• Rogan josh — the one you already know, and better here than anywhere else.
• Yakhni — mutton in a pale, cardamom-scented yoghurt gravy.
• Dani phool — not a flower: it is cauliflower, and it is usually the best vegetarian course.

If you are vegetarian

Tell us before you book anything. A traditional wazwan is overwhelmingly meat, but a vegetarian spread is completely possible and excellent — nadru (lotus stem), nadru monje (lotus stem fritters), palak nadru, dum aloo, rajma, and Kashmir's extraordinary haakh, a collard green that tastes nothing like any green you have had.

Where to eat it

The best wazwan is rarely in a hotel. It is cooked for weddings and gatherings, and the wazas who do that will take a private order for a small group with a day's notice. We arrange one or two wazwan evenings a month for guests, usually on the houseboat.

The non-wazwan things you must try

• Kahwa — green tea with saffron, almond and cardamom. Nowhere near as sweet as the version sold in sachets.
• Nun chai — salt tea with butter. An acquired taste and an honest one. Try it once.
• Harissa — a slow-cooked mutton and rice breakfast made through winter. Only available from January to March, and worth a trip on its own.
• Girda — the local bakery bread, best bought warm at seven in the morning.

One word of warning

Kashmiri food is not hot by Indian standards — the heat is mild and the flavour comes from fennel, cardamom, ginger, dried fruit and yoghurt. Guests expecting Punjabi or Chettinad spice are often surprised. If you want heat, ask your driver where he eats; that is where you will find it.