The smoked fish delicacy from Kashmir, is getting rarer with each winter. When autumn ends and winter begins, stacks of dry grass start piling up in Soura, Srinagar, along the Anchar lake.

Soura, a locality of Srinagar is located at the edge of Anchar lake. Soura is famous for Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, a multi-specialty hospital, it is also the deemed medical university of Kashmir valley.

Fish is smoked for preservation and is called Phae’ir (plural Phae’rei/ Fae’rie). The local lake fish is first sun dried on dried grass for a few hours till the water is drained and then smoked.

Smoked fish is prepared by smoking the fish over slow-burning grass and sold by members of the Tippli community living on the banks of the Anchar lake.

The main source of water is the network of channels of River Sindh. According to Lawrence the area of the lake in 1894 was 19.54 sq. km, which shrunk to 6.5 sq.km in 2004, and is highly polluted and has deteriorated over the years.