Zabiha Halal Family run Since 2024 Devon Ave · Chicago

A taste of Kerala,
on Devon Avenue.

Slow-cooked the way our mothers cooked it — appam steamed in iron pots, biriyani layered on dum for forty minutes, dosas pulled paper-thin on a 400°F flat griddle. From a tiny family kitchen on Devon Avenue.

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Where it all begins

From these hills to your table.

We cook the food of Kerala's coast — coconut milk, curry leaf, cracked black pepper, biriyani layered slow on dum — out of one small kitchen on Devon Avenue.

Western Ghats spice Coconut coast Malabar kitchen
Kerala · South India

God's own country, on a plate.

Kerala sits on India's southwest coast — 600 km of Arabian Sea, palm-lined backwaters, and the spice routes that drew Romans, Arabs, and Portuguese traders for two thousand years. Every plate we cook carries that history.

KERALAM
Land of the coconut
"Kera" is Malayalam for coconut. Every curry we make starts here — toasted, ground, or simmered into milk.
POROTTA
Flaky & hand-pulled
Layered Malabar flatbread, slapped and coiled by hand — made for our curries and dry fries.
PEPPER
The original black gold
Kochi was the world's pepper port for 2,000 years. We crack ours fresh, daily.
MATTA
Red rice, served warm
A short-grain heirloom from Palakkad. Earthy, slightly sweet — Kerala eats it daily.
Appam with egg curry on a banana leaf
Chicken biriyani served in a clay pot
Puttu with kadala curry and pappadam

Kerala · God's own country

From the backwaters to Devon Avenue.

Featured in

The Chicago Reader

"Mintza abides by the food of northern Kerala" — Mike Sula, July 2025

100+
Dishes on the menu
4.6★
Google rating · 319 reviews
18h
Dosa batter fermentation
2245
W Devon Ave · Chicago
From the regulars

What Devon Avenue is saying.

New · Catering Live dosa counter at a Mintza catered event
Feeding ten to a hundred

A Kerala feast, delivered warm.

Office lunches, birthdays, engagement parties, weddings. We cook it the way we cook it at home — slow, generous, banana-leaf served if you want it. Three sizes, one halal kitchen.

Live dosa counter available for all types of events.

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We keep it warm

Come sit with us.
Dinner's ready.

Family recipes from Kerala, cooked fresh on Devon Avenue. Walk in any time, or reserve a table for the weekend.

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