‘Chicken tabak-maaz’: Tease your tastebuds with unique dish  in Kashmir

Srinagar: If you are tired of eating ‘Qurban Maaz’ (sacrificial red meat) these days, try a chicken ‘tabak-maaz’ to tease your taste buds.

While the usual mutton variant is an essential ingredient of Kashmir’s famed ‘wazwan’ cuisine, a city based chef has innovated a chicken tabak-maaz that has impressed the foodies and amazed the netizens in Kashmir.

Though it does not taste like the usual mutton variant, it is crispy and looks like a regular tabak-maaz.

Basit, who belongs to a family of chefs in Fateh Kadal area of the old city, said they had made chicken tabak-maaz after demand of making ‘something different’ from their customers.

“During Eid-ul-Adha, there is mutton everywhere and ahead of every Eid, we get demand for new items from customers. They say we want something different and for this Eid the customers were again demanding that we should come up with new dishes for Eid. This is for the first time anybody tried making a chicken tabak-maaz in Kashmir,” said Basit.

He said they had used ice-cream sticks to ‘replace ribs’ to give the chicken tabak-maaz a real ‘look’.

“Tabak-maaz is made of lamb ribs and we replaced the ribs with sticks to give it a real look. All eat wazwan and nothing can replace it but people are loving this new variety as the market always wants something new,” he said.

Valley based food blogger Omar Rather of ‘Kashmirfoodgram’ fame said Basit’s family had always given ‘new twists’ to wazwan and the chicken tabak-maaz was a good option for those who do not take mutton due to health or other reasons.

“I was amazed to see this chicken tabak-maaz and foodies love to come across new dishes. This family of chefs from Fateh Kadal has always given new twists to wazwan. During Ramadan earlier this year, they had turned several wazwan dishes into pickles. Their wazwani achar had remained among the most sought after delicacies in Shehr-e-Khaas during Ramdan and now they have come up with tabak-maaz. It is a good option for those who do not take mutton due to health or other reasons,” he said.