"You don’t know them? They are the first to sell roti in St James. From ever since, you could get roti no matter what time you come out." The words of a man as he waits in line to purchase a roti from Kanhai Roti on the Western Main Road in St James.
And he’s not wrong. According to the owner of the business Sandra Ramjohn, it was her grandparents that started the tradition over 75 years ago.
"My grandmother started this off because of a need to mind her children. She had eight children," Ramjohn said.
Ramjohn,62, recalled that 'they built a box cart and they used to put food in it, they rolled it down the street. That’s how it started."
The family lived at Upper Bournes Road in St James and started selling close to where the popular Smokey and Bunty bar was located.
"That is how my grandmother did it with a stove and coal pot. A table with a coal pot. I was a child. So, that’s how it started, with a coal pot. Now we have a ring stove with a gas tank," Ramjohn added.
Ramjohn said she got involved in the family business from an early age.
"As a little girl 12-years-old they put me to help make roti home and from there I came up the road. Then when I was about 25, I went in the streets to do it too. It was part of a business."
After her grandmother, the mantle was passed to Ramjohn’s mother, then her. Only this year she passed the baton over to her son Shiraz.
As the years went by, the sidewalk roti grew in popularity.
"I know a lot of politicians who buy roti from us. There are also a lot of business people, lots and lots of people buy roti from us. They find us quite popular."
Ramjohn has not pinpointed the source of the customer's pleasure, but she has a fair idea.
"What we make is just a plain skin with the curry in it, I guess it is the taste. Is the taste that people keep coming back for," she said.
She said given the demand and magnitude it is difficult to say how many roti skins they make on a nightly basis, but noted that it is significant. According to Ramjohn, the main aim is to upkeep the standards set by her grandmother.
It has not always been smooth sailing, the business has had to move from several locations for a variety of reasons, but has always maintained a presence in St James. Ramjohn said lately they have had to battle with the Port-of-Spain City Corporation not wanting vendors on the streets.
But with people coming from all over the country and even abroad seeking out Kanhai’s Roti, it’s a battle she believes is definitely worth fighting.