For several decades, 70-year-old Asadullah Khan’s life has revolved around preparing a Kashmiri delicacy: the meal known as wazwan. Khan, a resident of Srinagar in Kashmir, learned his skills from his father as an adolescent. He had no choice. Khan belongs to a family as famed for their cooking as for their notorious moniker: the Shaitan waz’e, or “the devil chefs.” The family picked up this nickname nearly a century ago, during the term of Ghulam Mohammad Bakshi, the Prime Minister of the State of Jammu and Kashmir. Khan’s ancestors…
