Mics Papad

We make our papads in Nogori Maholla, which is part of the Civil Lines area. It’s not a big factory or anything like that. It’s just our family working together in the house we’ve lived in for decades. The whole place usually smells like cumin and black pepper. We’ve been making these papads for as long as I can remember. We do everything by hand, from mixing the dough to rolling it out thin. We don't use any of those big industrial machines because we think the texture is better when you do it yourself. Then we lay them out on mats to dry in the sun. If it’s a cloudy day, we can’t work as much, which is frustrating. But we just wait for the sun to come back out. We sell to the little shops around the neighborhood and to people who just walk up to our door. We don’t have fancy labels or bright plastic bags. We just wrap them up and hand them over. It’s a quiet, busy kind of life. My sisters and my mother are the ones who really know the recipes. I help with the heavy bags of lentils and the deliveries. We aren't trying to sell all over the country. We just like that the local families enjoy what we make. It feels good to see someone buying a pack for their dinner. It’s just simple, honest food made by people who care about how it tastes. We just keep the traditions going.