Photograph by Bailey Garrot
Suspended in time, the essence of a bygone era still lingers in the northern Indian city of Lucknow. The state capital of Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow is an emotion for locals, evoking visions of grandeur and opulence. Its future blossomed after Emperor Jahangir bestowed an estate elsewhere in the region to one of his governors, known as a nawab. A succeeding nawab shifted the seat of governance to Lucknow in 1775, lending his patronage to local arts, culture, and cookery. Under the nawabs emerged a cuisine designed to delight the gentry and gain political favors.
This was an age of elegance, creating the delicately nuanced Awadhi cuisine—which also represents a tradition, called Ganga-Jamuni, that grew out of the meeting of Hindu and Mughal culinary influences. The nawabs infused the local dialect with Urdu, a poetic language, extending words like lazzat (pleasure) and ittr (perfume) into culinary descriptions. A delicately prepared dish is described as one cooked with nazakat—grace. An elusive spice blend called lazzat-e-taam contains dozens of ingredients. Many dishes use floral fragrances.
Today, Lucknow’s streets retain their historic arched entrances bearing auspicious fish motifs. The skyline is dotted with domes and minarets, and evenings reverberate with calls to prayer. Street vendors offer a plethora of culinary delights, such as tangy chaats; sheermal, a yeasty flatbread made with cream and saffron; Tunday kebabs, made with the meat of water buffaloes and named for the one-armed chef who invented them; and a decadent lassi topped with heavy cream.
This chai rabdi lassi pays homage to these rich historical and culinary traditions. It embraces the regional love of cream, and the spiced black chai is a nod to its struggle for freedom against colonial rule. The flavors of a chai masala—layered with fennel, jaggery, and rose—evoke ittr and lazzat-e-taam, coming together in a dish that celebrates the nazakat-laden Lucknowi…
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