Kashmiri Wazwan

Thirty-six courses of mutton, four guests, and one carved copper platter between them. It belongs to the Regional Tables tradition of Kashmir.

The ultimate Kashmiri wedding feast is the Wazwan — a staggering banquet counted near thirty-six dishes, prepared by a master chef, the Vasta Waza. Guests sit in groups of four and eat from a single large, ornately carved copper platter, the trami.

It is almost entirely sheep meat, and the sequence matters: it opens with lighter yoghurt-based dishes like gushtaba — meatballs pounded to a velvet spring with wooden mallets — and moves toward the richer red curries such as rogan josh. Sharing one trami sets a natural pace among the four diners through a huge protein load.

The copper vessels are lined with tin, or kalai. That lining lets the cooks braise slowly and gently — important at altitude, where water boils cooler — and keeps the copper from reacting with the acidic yoghurt used heavily in dishes like yakhni.

Copper does have a genuine antimicrobial (oligodynamic) effect — but here's the honest twist: the tin lining exists precisely to keep copper away from the food, both to prevent toxic reactions with acid and because bare copper isn't safe for acidic cooking. Admire the trami for its craft and communal spirit, not as a food-purifier.

Yes. We cook traditional Regional Tables menus for 25 to 5,000 guests across Chennai and Tamil Nadu, including live counters and banana-leaf service. Share your date and guest count on our enquiry form and we will build a menu around it.