Manoj Namkeen

We started Manoj Namkeen in Mahavir Colony quite a few years ago. Our place is tucked away in Gali No. 2, right near Gupta Hotel. If you walk down the lane, you can usually smell the spices and the oil from the street. We spend our mornings frying batches of sev, bhujia, and different kinds of mixtures. It gets really hot in the back where the large stoves are, but we are used to it by now. The floor is always a bit slippery from the oil, so we have to be careful when we walk around. We pack everything into small plastic bags and seal them by hand. Sometimes the seals aren't perfect, but the snacks inside are always fresh. We don't have a big storefront with lights. It’s mostly just a small room where we stack the finished bags on metal racks. People from the colony come by in the evenings to get something crunchy for their tea. We also supply a few small shops nearby when we have extra stock. My wife handles the packaging while I focus on the cooking part. We buy our spices from the main market every Tuesday. Sometimes we run out of certain items if there’s a festival coming up. It’s a lot of manual labor, and our hands often smell like turmeric and chili. We don't do any big advertising. People just know where we are by word of mouth. It's a simple life making snacks for the neighborhood we live in.