Food Sentimentality
A bowl of pickled vegetables almost made me cry the other day.
I was eating at my family restaurant Hafez with my friends, when we were brought over a bowl of torshi – mixed pickled vegetables. “I thought you might like this”, explained Mo (our waiter, but basically a family member. I’ve known him as long as I can remember). “It was the last batch your dad made”. My dad passed away last year. They had kept a portion sealed and stored away, which meant that for the last time, I was able to try something that he had prepared. This is an extreme example, but one that illustrates how food bridges a gap over time. It has the power to link people to places, not just in a literal sense like with the torshi. When you eat something, you’re enjoying the recipes and techniques from centuries of cooks, adapted and refined, travelling through lessons to end up on your plate. The history of a place can be discovered through the food. It also transports you back to times in your own life – fish and chips on the beach as a child, cheap hot dogs after swimming at the leisure centre, sugar coating your fingers after (rare) Woolworths pic n mix.
Our family had restaurants in Tehran and my dad grew up in these kitchens, learning ancient techniques from some of the best chefs in Iran. He used to tell me stories of the hectic lunch service, with an obscene amount of customers descending upon the restaurant within those hours. This was a military operation with diners brandishing a cut-throat, eat-and-go attitude. With so many other places to dine in the area, speed, quality and efficiency set their restaurant apart. When my dad came to London in the 80s and his journey with Hafez began, he applied all these secrets to the tiny kitchen in London, from the butchery to the marinades, the cooking style to the menu.
Opened in 1983 by Nusrat and Jessie Tadjiky, Hafez was one of the first Persian restaurants in London. Our recipes remain relatively unchanged, and our staff does too. Our baker has been with us almost as long as we’ve been open, so if you came to Hafez 20 years ago and visit again tomorrow, chances are you’d be eating bread made by the same person. My aunties, uncles and cousins are front of house and I was too for over 10 years.
Food, and more specifically that restaurant, was my dad’s life. He spent most of his time working so some of my earliest memories are visiting him there, feeling immense pride when he came out from the kitchen in his chef whites to see me. I started working there as soon as I could. Each day I had work, I’d go in early with him and watch him prepare the food himself as he talked me through the process. Which part of the lamb is chenjeh, otherwise known as ‘King’s Cut’. The secret to succulent kubideh, which is minced in-house and made by hand. Where to cut to ensure the perfect lamb chops. He taught other chefs over the years, many who went on to open their own Persian restaurants in London. But many stayed, perhaps for the love of the restaurant and the feeling of home it brings.
Years of working there has shown me I’m not the only person who feels sentimental about the restaurant. There are customers that have been coming to Hafez for as long as it has been open – generations of people who have walked through those doors, who have grown up eating the food that my family have lovingly prepared, day in and day out, for all this time. I’ve had conversations with adults who have childhood memories at the restaurant, back in the days when the bread oven was at the front by the window, so the smell of freshly baked bread greeted you as you walked through the door. A customer told me that him and his family once lived round the corner, but now live all over the world and no longer have a home in London so for them, Hafez is that home. A place to go when a celebration is in order, and when comfort is needed, too. Somewhere that has stood the test of time and has remained relatively unchanged in all the right ways.
For me, the restaurant has taken on a whole new meaning. It may sound cliche, but my dad really is in the soul of that place. His expertise is in the food, his standards are upheld in the kitchen, and his hospitality and warmth can be found front of house. It’s in the capable hands of my family, who have been running it alongside him for the past decade. But now, whenever I eat there, I feel like he’s made me a meal again.
