Coonoor’s Bulbulz Biryani and Kebab at Habba Kadal adds Kashmiri pulaos on the menu

Bulbulz Biryani and Kebab at Habba Kadal in Coonoor lays out an all-new Kashmiri menu

It’s a dream-worthy bread basket. The girda or the indispensable Kashmir flatbread arrives crisp, baked to golden perfection, and shiny with dents all around as it is flattened by hand. The lavasa, a softer, tender, an equally addictive bread sits pretty in the handcrafted Kashmiri wicker basket along with the crumbly, saffron-flavoured sheermal, and katlam, a flaky bread topped with poppy seeds.

I tear a piece of the bread and scoop up chicken kanti, a popular, smoky dish, served as an accompaniment. It is spicy, tangy, semi-dry and has bite-sized, boneless classic chicken sheekh marinated in yogurt and spices, and later tossed with chopped onion and tomato.

The Kashmiri bread basket | Photo Credit: SATHYAMOORTHY M

My dinner platter from Bulbulz Biryani and Kebab, a new brand under Habba Kadal, a Kashmir-themed stay in Coonoor, is a peek into the Kashmiri way of life. It is named after the beloved songbird of Kashmir that appears in poetry, carpets, and tapestries. “Bulbulz is as much about memory and romance as it is about food,” says Aparna Challu, who, along with her husband Upinder Zutshi, envisioned Habba Kadal. Aparna runs a social enterprise called Respect Origins, an online marketplace for rural artisans.

“For Kashmiris, the bulbul is a symbol of beauty and longing, a quiet narrator of love stories. That spirit carries through this culinary initiative, which focuses on refined, slow-cooked Kashmiri pulaos, kebabs, and breads, food that speaks softly but lingers long after the meal ends,” explains Aparna. Bulbulz lays out exotic pulaos such as mutton yakhni, Irani berry pulao and the quintessential mutton ristha pulao.

Chingar-style chicken kebab, finished table-side | Photo Credit: SATHYAMOORTHY M