Every name carries a memory. Ours carries the weight of stone and the silence of a garden in Kashmir that changed how we saw everything we were building.
In 2006, long before Kanz & Muhul was a brand or even a thought, our family returned to our ancestral home in Kashmir for the first time since the exodus of 1990. Sixteen years. There is no word for what that journey was.
In one corner of the garden, half-forgotten and yet utterly undeniable, sat a large stone mortar and pestle. It was not displayed. It was not celebrated. It was simply there, as it had always been, as it would always be. A prized possession of the household that had watched over births and mournings, festivals and migrations, decades of hands grinding spices into meals that held families together. It had stayed when we could not.
“This mortar & pestle had been around from the beginning, witnessing celebration and sorrow alike over the years.”
That image stayed with us. When the time came to name our platform for Kashmiri agro-commodities, the saffron, the walnuts, the ingredients we source directly from the Valley, no name felt right until that stone came back to us.
My parents, my brother and I chose the name together. Kanz & Muhul, mortar and pestle in Kashmiri. Two objects. One purpose. The most honest expression of what we believe about food: that it is the product of care, of patience, of staying true to the method your ancestors trusted.
Kanz (Mortar) & Muhul (Pestle)
The name is also our commitment. Everything we source, every strand of saffron, every walnut, is held to the same standard that stone mortar once held: pristine, uncompromising, unchanged by shortcuts. From harvest to your kitchen in the shortest time possible. No layers. No dilution.
Matamaal, our restaurant brand, was born from the idea of a grandmother’s home, the warmth and abundance of a matamaal, a place where you are fed without reservation. Kanz & Muhul is its counterpart: the quiet, immovable force behind that kitchen. The stone tool that never left. The one that outlasted everything.
We are glad you found your way here. Welcome to the world of Kashmiri cuisine and culture.
