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Nahoum & Sons

Nahoum & Sons confectionary Calcutta Kolkata
Nahoum & Sons confectionary Calcutta Kolkata Image: Wikimedia Commons. Guru-45 / CC BY-SA 4.0

Overview

Nahoum & Sons, often referred to simply as Nahoum's, is a confectionery and bakery in Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Located inside the New Market complex on Lindsay Street, it is among the oldest continuously operating bakeries in the city and is widely recognised as a surviving institution of Kolkata's Baghdadi Jewish community.

Key facts

Name Nahoum & Sons
Type Bakery and confectionery
Founder Nahoum Israel Mordecai
Location New Market, Lindsay Street, Kolkata, West Bengal, India
Community association Baghdadi Jewish community of Calcutta
Country India

Background

The bakery was established by Nahoum Israel Mordecai, a member of the Baghdadi Jewish community that settled in Calcutta during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The Jewish population of the city, once numbering several thousand, was concentrated around central Calcutta and built synagogues, schools and businesses in the area surrounding Bowbazar and the New Market. Nahoum & Sons grew out of this commercial milieu, initially serving Jewish, Armenian, Anglo-Indian and European clientele in colonial Calcutta.

History

The shop moved into its current premises within Sir Stuart Hogg Market (popularly called New Market), the colonial-era covered market in central Calcutta. The interior, with its wood-panelled cabinets and glass-fronted counters, has been retained largely unchanged, and the establishment is frequently cited in writing on Kolkata's heritage as an example of a surviving nineteenth- and twentieth-century retail interior.

Ownership and management has remained within the Nahoum family across generations. As the Jewish community of Kolkata declined sharply through the latter half of the twentieth century due to emigration to Israel, the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, Nahoum & Sons became one of the most visible remaining links to that community in the city.

Products

The bakery is known for a range of baked goods and confectionery, including:

  • Fruit cake, particularly associated with the Christmas season in Kolkata
  • Plum cake, brownies and macaroons
  • Cheese samosas, patties and savoury puffs
  • Rugelach, challah and other items reflecting Jewish baking traditions
  • Marzipan, fudge and assorted confectionery

The Christmas-season queues outside the shop are a regular feature of reporting on the festival in the city.

Significance

Nahoum & Sons is regarded as a cultural landmark of Kolkata. It is routinely featured in heritage guides to the city and in writing on the Baghdadi Jewish diaspora of South Asia. Together with the Magen David Synagogue, the Beth El Synagogue and the Neveh Shalome Synagogue, the bakery is treated as part of the small surviving footprint of Calcutta's Jewish heritage.

References