Billing for your restaurant in Jammu and Kashmir
The trami for four, the extra plate, the tour group and the harissa pot, on one bill.
Why a Kashmir kitchen loses count: the shared trami, the terrace and the room, and the harissa pot
A trami for four, with six at the table
A wazwan comes on a copper trami meant for four people to share. Two cousins arrive, the waiter adds two plates to the same table, one guest asks for an extra kebab, and another wants only rice. By the end the table has a dozen small changes, and the bill in the waiter's hand is written from memory.
The terrace, the ground-floor room and one kitchen
In the warm months the first-floor terrace fills at noon, while the ground-floor room has the regulars. Orders are shouted down one stair to one kitchen, and a plate for the terrace goes to the room. The waiter carrying the bill does not know which table ordered what, and the cashier starts the sum again.
Harissa cooked in the night, sold by nine
On cold mornings a pot of harissa is cooked through the night, and it is sold by plate until it is gone, often before nine. A neighbour takes a plate on a promise to pay later, another takes three for the house. When the pot is empty you cannot say how many plates went and how many were given away.
Tools for a restaurant that serves a wazwan and a cup of noon chai
Bills on your phone
A table's bill that grows as plates are added, with the trami, the extra plates and the kahwa each on their own line.
UPI payments
A QR code at the cash box for the guide who pays for twenty with one scan, instead of counting notes in the doorway.
Online orders
A page from which a family outside the lane orders a trami for the next day, so the cook knows the count before the shutter is up.
Daily reports
The summer days beside the winter days, so you can see how much the kitchen cooks when the lanes are full and how much when they are not.
The markets and orchards that feed a Kashmir kitchen
A Kashmir kitchen buys vegetables, fruit and walnuts from these places and serves in the lanes around them.
- Lal Chowk is Srinagar's central commercial area for textiles, handicrafts and souvenirs; Polo View Market is known for handicrafts and carpets.
- Jammu city's Narwal fruit and vegetable mandi was upgraded between 2021 and 2023 with improved sheds, a Mandi Plaza building and a 100-tonne weighbridge.
- Baramulla is the largest producer of horticulture products in J&K, with vast apple orchards.
- Most people in Kupwara depend on agriculture and horticulture, and walnuts are a major product and business of the district.
From one trami for four to the last plate of harissa
The trami as one item, and the extra plate beside it
Make the trami for four one item at its own rate, and the extra plate another. When two more cousins sit down, their plates are counted with the trami, and at the end one bill is made with both, the same bill the cashier reads out.
The terrace and the room share one kitchen, and each plate finds its own bill
The terrace and the room below are served from one kitchen. A plate called for the terrace can be carried into the room by a hurried boy. Keep the terrace's bills and the room's bills apart, and the plate lands on the bill of the place that ordered it.
Three plates for the house and one for the neighbour, read off the pot
Set harissa as an item by the plate and note the pot as so many plates when it is cooked. Three plates go to the house each morning, made as bills at no charge so the pot's number falls true. The neighbour who takes a plate on a promise goes on his own page. Nothing leaves the pot without a bill.
Questions Kashmir restaurant owners ask
Six people sit at a trami made for four. How do I add the two extra without changing the rest?
Add the two plates when they are asked for, after the trami is served. Read the bill again and the trami is where it was, with the two plates under it, so the table sees exactly what was added.
A wazwan is cooked by the kilo of meat but served by the plate. How do I count the plates?
Put the kilos of meat cooked in as the item's stock, and bill the plates as they are served. The plates sold against the kilos cooked is the figure you carry to the next wedding.
On a bitter cold morning people queue for harissa before the shutter is up. Can I bill from the pot while I set up?
Yes. Harissa is an item by the plate, so bill each plate as it is ladled, even before the board is out. The queue at the shutter keeps moving, and you set up between plates.
A table orders kahwa for the whole group while a walker takes one cup at the counter. Are they one sale?
No. The table's flask goes on the table's bill, and the cup goes on its own quick bill, both from the same pot. Each has its own rate, so the day's sales show what the tables took and what the counter took.
The tourist months in Kashmir and what they do to a kitchen
Kashmir drew about 2.95 million tourists in 2024, up from 2.71 million in 2023 and 2.67 million in 2022, according to official data. Each year there are more mouths to feed in the lanes, and a restaurant that served the last year's crowd now serves a larger one.
In July and August Kashmir sees its maximum tourist arrivals; one August 2021 day saw 8,059 passengers on 62 flights at Srinagar airport. Those weeks put the most plates through the kitchen of the whole year, and a day's sales at closing say how many.