Food History of Mumbai

Key eras

1534, Portuguese arrival and the pao

The Portuguese took the seven islands from the Sultan of Gujarat in 1534 and held them for 127 years. They left behind the white bread roll, called pao after the Portuguese word for bread. Centuries later that same loaf would carry pav bhaji, vada pav and kheema pav into Mumbai's daily diet.

1661, the dowry handover to the British

The islands passed to Charles II as part of Catherine of Braganza's dowry in 1661. The East India Company leased them in 1668 and the trading post began pulling in merchants from Surat, Gujarat and Persia. The cosmopolitan eating that defines the city today was already taking shape on those docks.

1850s, the textile mills and pav bhaji

When the American Civil War cut off cotton supplies to Lancashire, Bombay's mills boomed. Mill workers needed cheap, quick lunches that did not require utensils. Vendors near the mills mashed leftover vegetables with spice and served the mash with the Portuguese pav. Pav bhaji was born and spread out from Tardeo to the rest of the city.

1904, the first Irani cafes open

Iranian Zoroastrian migrants fleeing persecution in Yazd began opening high-ceilinged cafes across South Bombay. Kyani and Co opened on Marine Lines in 1904 and trained generations of new arrivals in cafe operations. At their peak in the mid-twentieth century Mumbai counted more than a thousand Irani cafes. Bun maska, brun maska, akuri and sweet milky chai became a shared morning ritual.

1923, Britannia and Co opens in Ballard Estate

Rashid Kohinoor opened Britannia and Co in Wakefield House in 1923, serving the British clerks and Parsi traders who worked the new business district. His son Boman Kohinoor ran the room until he died at 97 in 2019, greeting every customer personally. The berry pulao with Iranian zereshk berries became the city's most distinctive Parsi dish.

1966, vada pav invented at Dadar station

Ashok Vaidya ran a snack stall outside Dadar railway station selling poha, batata vada and tea to mill workers and commuters. In 1966 he started slipping the deep-fried potato vada inside a pav with red garlic chutney and a fried green chilli. The format spread across the city within years; Mumbai now counts more than 20,000 vada pav stalls.

2015, the modern Indian movement

Floyd Cardoz, Sameer Seth and Yash Bhanage opened The Bombay Canteen in Kamala Mills in February 2015, treating regional Indian cooking with the precision of a tasting-menu kitchen. Masque opened the same year in Mathuradas Mill Compound, run by Prateek Sadhu and now Varun Totlani. Both rooms helped reframe what Indian fine dining could mean.

Immigrant influences

• Koli (original fishing community): The Koli were Mumbai's original inhabitants. Their bombil, surmai and prawn cookery and the sun-dried bombay duck on bamboo valandis still anchor coastal kitchens like Mahesh Lunch Home and Trishna.
• Parsi (Persian Zoroastrian): Parsis arrived from Persia from the 10th century and concentrated in Bombay from the 17th. Berry pulao, sali boti, patra ni machhi, kheema pav and dhansak define Sunday lunch. Britannia and Jimmy Boy cook it old-style.
• Irani (Iranian Zoroastrian, 19th and early 20th century): Iranian Zoroastrians fleeing Qajar persecution opened over a thousand Irani cafes across South Bombay. Bun maska, brun, akuri, mawa cake and Irani chai still pour at Kyani and Co, Yazdani Bakery and Sassanian.
• Gujarati and Marwari: Gujarat's vegetarian thali tradition arrived with merchants and clerks. Tardeo, Kalbadevi and Walkeshwar are full of Gujarati rooms; Swati Snacks and Soam carry the modern version of that vegetarian cooking.
• Goan and Mangalorean Catholic: Konkan migrants brought pork sorpotel, beef indad, vindaloo, fish curry rice and coconut gravies. Mahesh Lunch Home (Fort, 1977) was Bombay's first Mangalorean room; Bandra Catholic kitchens still mix bottle masala.
• South Indian (Tamil, Malayali, Udupi): Matunga became Mumbai's South Indian quarter from the 1930s, with Udupi-run pure-veg rooms serving filter coffee, idli, dosa and Mangalorean ghee roast. Cafe Madras has poured filter coffee at Kings Circle since 1940.
• Dawoodi Bohra Muslim: The Bohra community runs Mohammed Ali Road kitchens and the Bohri Mohalla kebab lanes. Smoked mutton biryani, raan, dabba gosht and the multi-course thal eaten from one shared platter are the core Bohri contributions.
• Sindhi (post-1947 partition): Sindhi refugees settled in Ulhasnagar, Sion and Chembur after Partition. Sai Mishtan Bhandar and other Sindhi sweet shops popularised dal pakwan, sai bhaji and lola for breakfast across the suburbs.

Signature innovations

• Vada pav, the original mill-worker street sandwich, invented 1966
• Pav bhaji, the mashed vegetable curry on Portuguese pav
• Berry pulao, the Parsi rice with Iranian zereshk berries
• Bombay sandwich, the white-bread chutney sandwich with optional grill
• Bombil rava fry, semolina-coated Bombay duck
• Bohri thal, the eight-course shared platter eaten with the right hand
• Falooda, the rose-syrup ice cream drink with vermicelli and basil seeds
• Frankie, the wrap of spiced filling in flatbread invented at Tibbs in 1969