The Matri-Maker of Aligarh

Aligarh ki matri or Aligarh ke biscuit, as it is also called, is nothing special to look at: it just looks like a giant cookie, the size of a quarter plate.

But when you bite into it, its taste arguably puts any French biscuit to shame: it is sweet with a subtle taste of spices, especially cardamom, and is usually eaten with butter lathered on top, with your morning cup of tea. 

No one knows who invented Aligarh ki matri but the oldest kaarigar or craftsman, as the matri-makers call themselves, that everyone refers back to is Latif Khan. 

  

Aligarh matri & Woolf

  

Khan was born in the late 1890s in Pathano-ki-basti, Gorakhpur, according to his grandson Mohammad Shaffo (65), who was also his student.

Making matris was Khan’s "baap-dada ka kaam" or his ancestral work, says Pervez Alam (62), his former pupil. Khan’s other grandson, Abdul Tauheed (46), says that Khan learnt it from his father.

If this is the case, then it stands to reason that Aligarh ki matri is not from Aligarh at all but Gorakhpur, Khan’s place of birth.** 

Khan worked there in the military where he used to bake double rotis, says Shaffo. 

It would have been the British Indian Army that employed Khan since Gorakhpur, like the rest of India, came under the direct rule of the British after the 1857 Rebellion. 

Latif Khan moved to Aligarh after his marriage; Alam conjectures that he or his wife had relatives there. 

This would have been before 1913, as that is when Khan took on a new student, Rehmat Beg, according to the latter's son Rahat Beg, himself a kaarigar and owner of Khurram Pappe and Bharat Bakery in Russellganj. 

He lived in Sarai Hakim, a neighbourhood right next to Russellganj, where he established a tandoor or earthen oven in his house and started a bakery business from there.

Shaffo says that he became so famous for his matri that people would bring huge baskets and fill these to the brim to take with them and eat later. This is because matris like biscuits can last long if kept in a cool, dry place.

Mohammad Shaffo, Latif Khan's grandson, at his home in Shah Jamal, Aligarh.

Shaffo also remembers that his grandfather's matri workshop was full of students in training to become matri-kaarigars. 

This included all his brothers, his sons, and even his grandsons. 

Shaffo was ten when his turn came. He recalls that he was carrying a pail of water up the stairs when his uncle came up and told him that his grandfather wanted him in his workshop.

Those who were taught by Khan taught others. 

One person to benefit from this passed-down knowledge was Sajid Khan’s father Bundu Khan.

Sajid Khan, who is a tailor, says his father was trained at the Sardar Biscuit Factory, established in the 1920s, by a kaarigar called Babu Khan. He, in turn, was taught by Latif Khan’s younger brother Majeed Khan.

As a child, Sajid Khan recalls seeing his father carry matris on his bicycle to the Aligarh Muslim University, where it was popular among the students.

But before independence the matri faced stiff competition from the double roti, says Tahir Warsi (90) who worked at the Sardar Biscuit Factory in the 1940s. He said that this was because the British preferred the double roti to matris and they would eat the former with a plate of qorma at noon sharp. 

After independence was another story as the matri overtook the double roti and went from being a neighbourhood favourite to becoming a town favourite. 

Here, a kaarigar at Azad Bakery wraps the fresh matris. The blue wrappers are for regular matris that sell for Rs 36. The "Special Matri" has khoya in it and costs Rs 60.

By the 1980s there were 50-60 shops in Sarai Hakim alone selling matris, says Mohammad Bashir (55), owner of Azad Bakery, whose brother, Mohammad Suleiman, was Latif Khan’s student.

One of the main reasons for the matri's popularity was its unique taste. 

Back then kaarigars would add cardamom, nutmeg, and poppy seeds that many now cannot afford. 

Another ingredient was a special masala of 25-30 traditional medicines that kaarigars continue to use even today. 

Each kaarigar I spoke to said that they had the recipe written down on a piece of paper although none ever produced this piece of paper. They said that they had received it from their ustad or teacher, who, in most cases, was Latif Khan. 

All of them said that this masala was invented by a traditional healer by the name of Luqman Hakim. 

Luqman is a popular historical figure, also referred to as "Luqman the Wise", who is part of pan-Islamic folklore. One can easily find YouTube videos that talk about his teachings, including on plant-based remedies. 

Tauheed however disagrees saying that it was Khan's family who came up with the recipe and Khan used to prepare the masala himself by hand. 

Kaarigars add this masala to industrial yeast, although the original recipe calls for curd, which they replaced 15 years ago.

Back then it would take them three days to make matris but even now it takes an average of 16 hours, says Alam who now works at Taj Bakery, in Upar Kot, a ten-minute walk from Sarai Hakim.

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It is long, hard work.

A kaarigar spends more than an hour kneading the dough, another hour tossing it, three hours cutting it into individual pieces, and about four hours rolling each into a flatbread. 

Mohammad Bashir makes pedes from leavened dough. His is one of the only shops left in Aligarh where they bake their own matris. Most bakeries don't make their own matris; rather they get them from small home-based bakeries, which are also now shutting down. 

  

Yet the kaarigars' wages are less than the Rs 400 a daily-wage bricklayer earns for an 8-hour workday, says Alam. 

As a result, most do not plan on passing on their knowledge of making matris to their children. 

Mohammad Nizamuddin (28), co-owner of Taj Bakery, says he continued working as a kaarigar on his father's advice and now, after his death, wants to continue the family name. But when I ask him if he will teach his children, he says: “Nahi nahi, bilkul bhi nahi.” (No. Absolutely not).

In his five decades as a kaarigar, Alam says his children have grown up watching him come home at all hours of the night, dead tired. They don’t see any reason to learn this work. 

"Door bhaagte hai," he says. (They run away from it.)

The kaarigars are also aging. Nizamuddin was one of the only ones in his 20s. 

His brother, Mohammad Fakhruddin (26), says that the average age of a kaarigar is sixty. Most whom I met were not less than 50 years old. “15 saal maan lo,” he says. (Give it 15 years). 

Once they pass away, this knowledge goes with them. 

For Alam though, it is yet another day of making matris. 

As he rolls a piece of dough into a perfect circle, he recalls one of Khan's tips: "Khameer batayegaa ki main kaise chal raha hoon.” (The fermented bread will tell you how it's cooking.)

What Khan meant, Alam says, is that a kaarigar who trains himself to listen to an imperceptible “chu, chu” sound that the khameer makes when it is rising, will always be able to gauge if it is cooking too slowly or too fast.

Tandoor at Azad Bakery. After it rises, the first batch of matri cooks in less time as the fire is raging and as the tandoor cools down, it takes about 20 minutes. 

Khan passed away at the age of eighty in the late 1970s. 

Before that, he lost his home in Sarai Hakim after the India-Pakistan war of 1965. 

Two of his brothers had left for Pakistan during the Partition. Even though he stayed back, his house was marked as custodian property by the government.

He shifted to his daughter’s and started working at his son-in-law’s bakery in Upar Kot. 

There, he continued teaching others how to make matri; Alam continued to train under him.

Pervez Alam places a piece of unbaked matri on a tin sheet. All these sheets are stored in the windowless room behind him for at least four hours so that the matris can rise before being baked.

**Note (Added at 11:05 pm) : It cannot be confirmed beyond doubt that Aligarh matri is from Gorakhpur. Some claim that it was passed down from the French who were stationed at the Aligarh Fort under the Scindias. However, I was not able to find proof of this link and turned my attention to the first craftsperson instead. This blog post will be updated if there is any new information found about the origins of the matri.