Khowdy

The idea

Regional food deserves better packaging than nostalgia

Assam's pantry is extraordinary — chakhao black rice, komal chira, bora rice, til, jaggery, single-estate tea. Most of it never leaves the state in a form anyone outside would recognise.

Khowdy takes those ingredients and builds shelf-stable products around them without the usual compromises. No palm oil, because it is cheap rather than good. No refined flour where a millet does the job better. No essence where the real leaf can be ground into the dough.

• Second-flush Assam tea leaf ground directly into shortbread
• Chakhao black rice stone-milled from Majuli growers
• Date paste and jaggery instead of refined sugar
• Cold-pressed coconut and mustard oil, never palm