Bharat Halwai

Bharat Halwai is located in New Janta Colony, right near the S.P.S. Public School in Agra Cantt. Being so close to a school means our day is timed by the school bell. When those kids come out, the shop gets very loud and busy for a while. We have been here for a good amount of time now. The shop is small and a bit cramped with all the trays of snacks we make every morning. I usually have flour on my clothes by ten in the morning and the smell of ghee never really leaves. We don't use any modern machines for our cooking. We do it all by hand, the way we were taught. The floor is stone and it stays cool even when the kitchen area gets roasting hot. We don't have a menu printed out. People just look at what is fresh on the counter and point. We don't do any delivery or have a website to show off. If you want something, you just come to the colony and find us. Sometimes we sit outside on a wooden crate when there are no customers. We watch the traffic go by and talk to the neighbors. It is a slow kind of life, but we like it that way. We just keep making the same recipes every day and people keep coming back for them. That is enough for us to keep the fire going and the shop open.