America’s Best Restaurant Pays Homage to India’s Favorite Snack Food

As more and more American restaurateurs embrace street food—it’s shorthand for delicious and accessible—there’s growing interest in the history of dishes that we’ve long taken for granted.

Wherever you go in the world, the creation myth of street food begins with the rise of modern industry, mostly in the early 1800s. The scene is usually set like this: People are working in smoky factories and dank warehouses; the work is grindingly hard and the breaks cruelly short; to keep going, the bone-tired women and men need a quick meal that can be had for a few coins. Catering to this demand, carts and stalls spring up outside the gates, selling sandwiches, bowls of noodles or burgers.