Supported by
At 59, a Gutsy Chef Makes Her Restaurant Debut
You won’t necessarily find kebabs at Sofreh, Nasim Alikhani’s new restaurant in Brooklyn, but a bold, modern take on Persian cuisine.
In Persian cooking, herbs are measured in epic terms — by the quart, not the tablespoon.
Parsley, dill, cilantro, fenugreek and mint: Used in profusion, alone or in combination, they play the role of the vegetable rather than a garnish, adding their woodsy fragrance at every opportunity. Such was fate of the feathery greens that on a recent afternoon sat in front of Nasim Alikhani, the owner of Sofreh restaurant in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn.
Ms. Alikhani was cooking spicy fish in tamarind sauce from the south of Iran, which she learned from her best friend, Minoo Falsafi.
“I’m from Isfahan, which is a desert city, traditionally there’s no fish,” she said as she used both hands to scoop the herbs into a hot skillet.
“When Minoo first made this dish for me, I thought, ‘Wow, this is so delicious,’” she said. “It really opened my eyes. So what I’m doing now is her recipe.” The herbs sputtered and hissed.
“Except I’m changing it.”
Ms. Alikhani was a law student at the time of the Iranian revolution. She moved to New York by herself at age 23, without speaking much English. Eventually, she became a nanny for an Iranian family.
“That job saved me,” she recounted, as she caramelized onions in a pan next to the herbs. “I was in a bad way, very lonely and isolated.”
To assuage her homesickness, she started cooking regularly for the first time in her life. She found Persian ingredients at markets in Queens, and with practice she built her skills.
“It was always very simple things, rice and lentils,” she said. “But for the children, it was something new. They loved it.”
After nine years in New York, she was able to return to Iran to visit her family. Tasting Persian food again after such a long absence made her realize its wealth, complexity and diversity. She saw how the flavors build on one another, how experienced cooks coaxed different nuances out of herbs, spices, and all manner of meats and vegetables depending on the technique they used.
Whenever she went back to visit, she traveled across the country, cooking, eating, writing down recipes and immersing herself in the history of the ancient cuisine.
She learned, for example, that the fish in tamarind sauce probably originated with the African population living around Abadan, near the water. Then the dish traveled to Isfahan and beyond as people relocated after the Iran-Iraq war, taking their ingredients and traditions with them.
By then, she had married, and had two children. Back in New York with her family, she tried out all her new recipes on her friends and neighbors, even catering huge Persian feasts for hundreds of people. The idea to open a restaurant was always in the back of her mind, but she put it off year after year, waiting for her children to grow up.
She started the process in earnest when they were in middle school, but it wasn’t until they were out of college that she finally was able to open Sofreh in June. Just after she opened, Ms. Alikhani turned 59.
She interrupted her story as the herbs and onions were starting to shrivel and blacken.
“You see, they are really burning,” she said, pointing to the sticky brown coating on the bottom of both pans. “I do this intentionally. This is how to build the flavors.” She added that this is not how the sauce is made in Iran, where it’s cooked much more slowly at a lower heat. But she prefers the complexity of the dark caramelization.
This kind of updated, gutsy touch is evident across her menu, where she’s not afraid to rebel against tradition.
“I’m going to upset some people because I’m going to do pork and I’m going to do scallops, which you can’t get in Iran,” she said.
During the day before the restaurant opens, she cooks alongside her two chefs, Ali Saboor and Soroosh Golbabae, simmering intricate sauces; preparing fresh yogurt; and preserving fruits and vegetables like garlic, lemons, cherries and grapes.
Her chefs take over entirely once customers start arriving, allowing Ms. Alikhani to float from table to table in her small restaurant, as if she were hosting a giant dinner party in her home.
“Originally, I wanted to serve everyday food like my family would make, kuku, salads, rice,” she told me as she put some seared cod into the herb sauce to gently simmer, allowing the flavors to meld. (Kuku, an herb frittata-like dish, is a classic of Persian cuisine.)
“Then I realized, I cannot start with this,” she said. “I felt I needed to show my guests more special occasion food, how Persians throw parties. Because when we have a party, we throw a feast.”
Melissa Clark has been a columnist for the Food section since 2007. She reports on food trends, creates recipes and appears in cooking videos linked to her column, A Good Appetite. She has also written dozens of cookbooks. @MelissaClark • Facebook
Advertisement