Apun ka 'Vadapav'!!!

Mumbaikars love food and as the city hosts people from different cultures, it tends to offer lip-smacking delicacies and the number of new food items served in the city increases every day. But, if there is one such item which connects all the Mumbaikars, it is undoubtedly the ‘Vada Pav.’ Be it rich or poor, this mighty simple dish has been the favourite for many and over the years, the popularity of this dish has exponentially grown along with the fan base.

While we may all relish the dish, not many of us know the history behind the same. Here is the journey of the Vada Pav made from a brain to a belly!

The vada pav wasn’t always Mumbai’s favourite snack.

In 1971, from a nondescript food stall outside the city’s Dadar railway station, Ashok Vaidya started serving a gastronomic invention for hungry train commuters.

His recipe wasn’t rocket science: The vada is essentially a spicy potato ball, dipped in a coating of spiced-up chickpea batter and deep fried in hot oil. It is then tucked inside a soft bread called pav and served with green chillies and red chutney.

Today, this snack is synonymous with the city of Mumbai, with almost every resident, from factory workers to college students to Bollywood stars, unabashed in declaring their love for it. More than two million of these crispy, flavourful sandwiches are consumed in India’s financial capital and largest metropolis every single day.

For a city that’s always on the move, I think the vada pav makes for the quickest, wallet-friendly, on-the-go snack,  I think it’s the first ‘eating out’ experience for just about anyone in Mumbai. At this price, it cuts across social strata and is a great leveller.”

Yet, like every great Indian snack, even the vada pav‘s origins are disputed.

Ironically, both of vada pav’s main components – the potato and the bun – are European imports, brought into India by the Portuguese around the 17th Century. The only key ingredient originally belonging to the region – or even India – in the dish, is the besan (chickpea flour) in which the potato mix is coated before being deep-fried. Still, Mumbaikars consider the vada pav a thoroughly ‘Bombay’ (as Mumbai is still called by many of its residents) dish.

The goal was to convince Mumbaikars to spurn ‘outside’ snacks and embrace their own cuisine, a strategy that worked very well.

Today, the snack is being served in different forms, and here are some popular places to eat Vada Pav in Mumbai

• Kirti Vada Pav aka Ashok Vada Pav – Kirti College Lane, Prabhadevi
• Anand Vada Pav – Opposite Mithibai College, Juhu
• Shree Krishna Batatawada, Dadar West
• Aaram Snacks – Capital Cinema, CST station
• Graduate Vada Pav – Byculla East
• Gajanan Vada Pav – Thane
• Samrat Vada Pav – Vile Parle