Mumbai's #1 Street Food is the World’s Most Eaten Sandwich

[crowd chattering]

[Meherwan] Woo.

If you're in Bombay,

there's one sandwich you have to eat.

It's the Vada Pav.

It's a potato dumpling,

spiced, dipped in chickpea batter,

in a bun, with glorious chutneys, tamarind.

Millions are sold every day, all across the city.

It's the number one sandwich on the planet.

And right behind me is Aram Vada Pav.

They sell thousands of Vada Pav a day.

We're gonna go inside and see how they do it.

Let's get into the kitchen.

All of this is happening

in less than 100 square feet.

They're making the vadas over in the corner.

Come on, let's take a look

at what Chef Chetan's doing over here.

So these are the actual vadas.

This is potato that's been boiled

and then spiced, with popped mustard seeds,

curry leaves, green chilies, ginger.

And a little bit of hing, asafetida.

It's the resin from this plant.

And it's a very simple recipe.

It isn't heavily masala-fied,

because the magic happens when he dips it

in the pakora batter.

The batter itself is also seasoned with salt.

It's made with chickpea flour.

And it's essentially got probably a hint

of turmeric, and a little bit of hing in it.

Then it's deep fried.

This has to be done by hand.

There's absolutely no other way to do it.

And he's perfected this technique.

The ball's getting tossed

from one hand to the other.

A quick dunk in the batter.

The batter's gotta be at the perfect texture,

not too thick, not too thin,

a little bit thicker than pancake batter.

And then dunk into the oil in such a way

so that it doesn't sink to the bottom,

and stays floating at the top.

It's set to roughly 200 degrees Celsius,

is what I can see on the front.

His range is between 200 and 250.

That's almost 400 degrees Fahrenheit,

extremely hot.

Because remember, he doesn't have to worry

about cooking the inside,

he just has to make sure that the outside

gets golden and crispy and fast.

There's 36 of the vadas in a tray.

And he gets 55 in it at one time.

So it's a practiced motion

where he is flinging a vada

from one hand to the other,

giving it a quick roll,

and dropping into the oil.

It's rolling off his fingertips.

Think of Michael Jordan making that final shot

in Game 6 against Utah.

The ball's just rolling off his fingertips.

It's really amazing.

I mean, there's no difference

in craftsmanship and trade.

It's just practice, timing, experience.

He comes from his village every week to do this,

Monday through Friday,.

And then the weekend he goes back to the village.

He is the Vada Pav specialist at Aram Vada Pav.

So he's gonna get 55 in there.

It'll take about two to three minutes.

It'll get in that tray and it'll start

immediately over all over again.

I just did the math real quickly.

If he's doing 55 every three minutes,

he's doing approximately a thousand an hour.

Separate from the oil he's collecting,

what we call the boondi,

the little crunchy bits

that drip off the batter into the oil,

and those are gonna be part of the sandwich also.

So you can ask for extra on the sandwich,

the boondi, the choora,

so that you get a beautiful, nice crunch

when you take a bite in the sandwich.

This red garlic chutney is the smell

of Maharashtra to me.

Tiny little baby garlic, sometimes fried,

sometimes dried in the sun,

peanuts, red chilies,

obviously dried red chilies,

salt, and then the choora,

this stuff is crumbled up and put into it.

Everybody's got their own technique

for how to make it.

These guys add a little bit of this to that,

and they make it fresh here almost every day,

and this is what gives Vada Pav's distinctive taste.

A Vada Pav without this, I mean...

Take a look at that hole in the window here.

This is where it goes.

Then up front are the maestros

doing the sandwich assembly.

So this entire operation,

99% of the Vada Pavs are going

through that tiny hole in the wall

to serve the hundreds of people gathered outside.

Let me show you the other side of the window.

Right back here.

Chetan, how are you?

This is where the food comes out,

the vadas come out.

They go straight into the bucket over here.

You got two assembly stations,

one on the right, one on the left.

Take a look at the crowd outside.

They're wondering what I'm doing in here.

They just want their Vada Pav.

They're ready to go.

Once the bun's open, the green chutney is spooned

under the top and smeared with the spoon.

Then they sprinkle the garlic red chutney,

which is dry onto the bottom, so it sticks

to the chutney and doesn't fall out.

The sweet chutney is squirted

under the bottom from the squeeze bottle,

vada stuffed on the inside,

and then the fried green chili is stuck on top.

Hand it to you on a piece of wax paper

if you're going to eat it here or wrapped up

if you're gonna take it to go.

We're not even in any kind of meal rush.

It's just a random time in the afternoon.

In about an hour, people will start emptying

out of offices.

But then I can't imagine

what this looks like at 8:00 PM as folks decide

that what they were craving for dinner,

what they were hankering for was a Vada Pav.

We're on the street.

Literally everywhere around me,

people are eating their Vada Pav

standing on the street.

I mean, this is the definition of street food.

The Vada Pav is to Mumbai what a slice of pizza

is in New York City.

I mean, it defines Bombay.

During the Civil War in America,

when cotton production plunged,

the cotton mills in Bombay went into overdrive so

that they could supply cotton

to the rest of the world.

Suddenly, factory workers were coming

out at all odd hours of the day,

and they needed to eat.

So the enterprising street cart vendors figured

out how to make on the fly dishes

on a tiny little hawker stand.

So they'd go to the bakeries

that were run by the Portuguese.

They were baking this roll called Pav,

which is the Portuguese word for bread,

and they put together these stomach filling meals

that could be done in bread with vegetables,

so that it would basically appeal to everybody.

And that's sort of the origin of the Vada Pav

and many of the other Pav dishes.

I'm salivating.

I've been waiting for this moment

for three days.

[speaking in Hindi]

Thank you.

25 rupees.

This is insane.

I mean, that's a quarter.

So I got my coupon, and luckily,

this seems to be a longer line

right now than folks picking up the vadas

so I got a break here.

Just gotta shove this in his face

and get his attention.

Can't be shy.

You gotta be aggressive, you gotta move in.

If I stand here and wait for people,

I'll be going further back every second.

Here we go, get right in there.

[speaking in Hindi]

And there's my green chili.

Let's walk with this bad boy.

I can't wait.

This is a love story to Mumbai.

I mean, it is.

We've got the green chutney on the top,

the vada itself,

on the bottom we got the tamarind chutney,

the sweet chutney as they call it,

meetha chutney, mixed in with some

of that red chili, garlic, peanut chutney,

and of course, the spicy fried chili on top.

So you get a little bit of heat.

I mean... [slurps]

Woo, I can't even describe

what's happening in my mouth right now.

The bread is so soft,

it literally just tears apart.

And then you hit the crunch

of the pakora batter on the outside,

and then the soft warm, almost umami

laden potatoes just sort of coat the inside

of the mouth with a creamy texture,

and then all of a sudden,

the bite of that red chili with the garlic

just hits your tongue, lights it up.

It makes you want to go back in

for another bite almost immediately.

It's a ritual cycle.

Bite burn, bite burn.

There are certain foods

that have a special thing about it.

I guess the word the English word we'd call

is crave worthy,

where every bite literally creates the desire

for the next bite.

I feel like that way with pizza

and Vada Pav's definitely one of those foods.

Every bite creates the desire for the next one.

That's when you know that you've got something

truly special happening.

It's a filling sandwich.

That's the idea behind a Vada Pav

is to fill the bellies

of hungry office workers, factory workers.

And it works as breakfast,

it works as a snack in between meals.

While we've been standing here,

we've seen students, we've seen panhandler,

we've seen businessmen in suits,

seeing lawyers coming out

of their courtroom cases,

and it's a universal food.

It transcends all ethnicities,

socioeconomic classes, rich, poor,

student, judge, victim,

everybody enjoys a Vada Pav.

If you come to Mumbai,

there's so much you can do here.

But the one thing you have to do

to have the quintessential Mumbai experience

is to have a Vada Pav.

It is the sandwich that defines the city.

Amazing history and an amazing sandwich.

That's Mumbai all wrapped up

in a package for you.

History, story, the personal touch,

and as always, the taste.