Can love truly blossom through the art of cooking? Join us for an intimate conversation with Natalie Jahangiry, a food and design entrepreneur who has skillfully blended her passions and cultures into a thriving business, Modern Persian Kitchen (we love the name too!). Natalie takes us on a heartfelt journey of her parent’s love story, and how her father’s Persian culinary expertise won her mother’s heart. Discover how Natalie’s family introduced Persian food to their quaint British village, and how her own daughter is growing up with the rich flavors of Persian cuisine.
Dive into the world of Persian food as we discuss Natalie’s innovative venture that marries her love for design with her culinary heritage. Natalie shares her experience in creating a bundle that allows individuals to easily explore Persian cuisine, from popular dishes like saffron chicken to more traditional fares like ghormeh sabzi . Learn how Natalie strikes a balance between her flourishing business and family life, while ensuring her children are immersed in the beauty of Persian culture. This heartening episode is a true testament to the power of food in connecting cultures and generations.
Take our listener survey! It’s quick and a great opportunity for you to let us know how we’re doing and what you’d like to hear in the future. Here is the link: LISTENER SURVEY!
This episode is sponsored by Exeer Botanical Sparkling Beverages.
Resources from this episode:
All Modern Persian Food podcast episodes can be found at: Episodes
Sign up for the email newsletter here!
Subscribe+ to the Modern Persian Food podcast on your favorite podcast player, and tell a friend.
Podcast production by Alvarez Audio
Transcript:
Intro
This is Modern Persian Food, a culinary podcast for today’s food enthusiast.
We talk about classic Persian flavors, modern recipes, and embracing culture and identity through food.
I’m Bita and I’m also Beata. Welcome to our show.
Bita
Hi, friends, welcome to episode 139. Today we’re going to be talking about blending cultures through food, and we have special guest, Natali Jahangiri. We’re delighted to have yo – food and design entrepreneur.
Natalie
Hi, thank you. It’s a pleasure, to have you here with us and along with my partner, the other, Beata.. Hi, Beata!
Beata
ii there, ladies. We’re going to be talking about blending cultures through food.
Bita
So four years ago today, congratulations, yeah it’s our business birthday today.
Natalie
So, yeah, four years ago. I mean, we had the concept before that, but officially we launched four years ago today. So that’s exciting, very exciting.
Bita
Fantastic and I absolutely love the business name Modern Persian Kitchen.
Natalie
Yes, very familiar.
Bita
Similar passion, right, yeah, allowing person to be accessible to many homes nationwide in the UK. And it sounds like you have two main passions a passion for paper and a passion for food.
Natalie
Yeah, exactly, so I kind of blended. as well as blending cultures, I blended my passions in design and food. So it works well for me
Bita
That’s awesome and photography your brand booklets and supper clubs. I love the branding of the boxes for your delivery, and so I just want to hear your perspective, your journey growing up in a blended family, what that was like with your dad being the chef, and now today as well, with your blended family.
Natalie
Yeah, so basically I’ll start at the beginning. So my mum and dad met when mum was at college and they met at a Valentine’s disco. It’s a very romantic story. They met at a Valentine’s disco and they saw each other across the room and since then they’ve been together and I think my mum was maybe 17. She was very young and they’ve basically been together ever since and she fell in love with this Persian kind of wonder, mysterious man. They moved to Florence and they expsomething absolutely foreign.
It was one of the first times she’s ever been with his friends and on like a dinner party kind of thing, and obviously she was quite young. So dad was cooking ghormeh sabzi (Persian herb and bean stew), and he told her it was grass and she believed him. But she ate it anyway, she said, because she’s very bright, like she comes from a very British background, and she said they put this bowl of food in front of me and it was green and it looked like grass, and then my dad was telling her it was grass and she was like, oh, I don’t know what I ate and she said she fell in love with it immediately.
Beata
Oh wow.
Natalie
I think that runs deep with Persian food just generally, doesn’t it? I mean, you put a bowl of food, it might not be the most attractive ball of food you’ve ever seen, but as soon as you’ve eaten it you fall in love immediately. So that whole kind of essence of food has run deep with our family, especially with my dad being a chef. I mean, he’s been a chef since I was really little. He used to be a photographer and they lived in Italy and he did photography. But then he came back and he realized he is creative but he wanted to do something creative with food and that was his passion. I guess being Persian food is so inbuilt in your culture anyway and it’s just like deep within your bones. So he started training to be a chef when we were younger and then went on to work with Raymond Blanc and other renowned chefs here in the UK Gordon Ramsay and people like that. So yeah, I mean, from that he started being a chef.
And then when we were younger, we’ve grown up on Persian food our whole life. And the same goes for all. My husband prefers the kebabs and the meaty kind of aspects of it, whereas I’m more of the stews and being massive piles of rice, since being tiny I used to have like piles of rice piled up on my plate. So yeah, I mean we used to get people come to our house like friends, like younger friends from school we must have been 12, 13, 14 and my mum would present them with some Persian food and they’d look at it and be like, oh what, is this dish, what’s this rice with beans in it and stuff, and they’d have it and as soon as they have it they fell in love with it immediately. And then they’d come back my friends when we were young come back and ask my parents to make them that food for their birthdays and every time they’d beg for tadigh (the crispy bottom of the rice pot delicacy).
It’s so funny from a really British kind of little village that we live in all these kids around the town asking for tahdigh/tahdeeg or baghali polo (rice with fava beans) or loobia polo (rice with green beans) . I mean we even brought rice cookers for some of our friends when we were younger. I love it, but yeah, that’s kind of how our blended family from my parents point of view, kind of through our culture of when we were younger, brought food into the aspect of our like heritage and being brought up with Persian food. But on my side with the kids, I mean they’re a quarter Persian but they’re pretty much brought up on a Persian culture. To be honest, it’s more prominent to me than the British side of it and the Persian side of it. So we always thought it was really important to bring in this Persian culture because it’s it’s such a culture of love and it’s a culture that’s so warming and it’s just, it’s a brilliant kind of aspect of who we are. So we’ve always thought it’s important, even though they’re a quarter, me and my husband, to bring in the culture side of it.
I mean they’re only little, so Lily’s three and Rosa’s now nearly one, but yeah, I mean we do, especially for Nooruz/Nowruz and events like that. We do all of the little bits that the kids can get involved in, and doing the half-sin table and painting eggs and and obviously all the food. I mean Rosa she’s been eating Persian food since she’s been tiny, so and Lily would literally, Lily’s the older one, she’ll sit with a plate of rice, like I used to, and yogurt and she asks for rice and yogurt constantly, which is super sweet. But we just think the traditions are very important to carry on through our families, and my mum has always embraced that as well, even from an older generation, she’s embraced that fully, and she can speak Farsi also, so so that’s pretty amazing, oh cool.
Beata
Yeah, that’s so cool, like I love that, you know.
It’s just really interesting because, like the evolution of you know families as they become more and more kind of blended with other cultures yeah it’s so special to me to when be able to connect and retain you know those individual cultures and so, you know, for my family we have a blended family. My, my husband’s not Persian, my kids are half, but just kind of introducing them to and having them exposed to the traditions and it’s just you know they, it gives them a sense of pride too. I think, yeah, which is kind of really special to have for them yeah, it’s really special.
I mean, for recently for Norooz/Nowruz, I went into my daughter’s nursery and we did with all the kids, we did a whole kind of like teaching about Norooz and we took the haft-sin and Lily was like holding up all the objects and being my happy little helper and explaining to everyone what they were and she was so proud and it was really lovely and then we were teaching all the kids and they were so interested. But I guess especially we live in London and that’s a blending pot in itself of all different cultures. But then having your own and your own identity and being able to pass that on is really important and again, it’s like you’re saying, it’s something to be really proud of. So it’s really lovely.
Bita
I love that story.
Beata
Yeah, I love that.
Beata
Hey, friends, just wanted to ask you a quick favor if you would like to join on to our mailing list. There’s three ways that you can do that. You can either go to our website, modernpersianfoodcom. You can scroll down in the show notes in whatever app you are using to listen to this podcast and there is a button that you can click to sign up for the newsletter. Or on Instagram, we have it in our bio direct links that you can sign up sign up and don’t skip a beat.
Bita
There’s so many threads, I hear, you know, to carry on the closeness to family and you know, love, and my daughter and I went on a recent trip in February to London and we went out for one Persian meal. But there actually is not a lot of Persian food, for what I could tell. And so it’s pretty fabulous what you’re doing and kind of taking your passions It’s what Beata joon and I have a passion for as well kind of like raising the awareness and making sure that enough people you know get a taste of it and it sort of spreading awareness and love of culture through food.
Natalie
Yeah, exactly, and I mean that’s why we created this business, essentially. As I was saying, food runs deep within our family. But also it’s not just about the food, it’s about the culture itself and we’ve always been brought up to. We have a big feast, but everything happens around the dinner table. We have conversations about every aspect of life around the dinner table. We used to sit down from a young age and talk about school and then we talk about worries with exams or we talk and everything’s about food. Obviously, my dad being a chef, that is kind of priority for him anyway, like the food aspect of it.
But it’s not just about that. I think it’s about the love and the sharing and having family time, and I think it kind of gets lost nowadays, where you’ve got so much social media and so much internet and everything’s in your face constantly in the TV that special time around the table and we try to do that as well to just take a break out of your everyday life, sit around and be together with some food. But you picked up on the fact that Persian food in the UK isn’t very prominent and it’s really not that prominent. I mean, it’s on the horizon and it’s kind of been there for a little while, but not as prominent as some of the big kind of like you’ve got Indian food and Chinese food or even Lebanese food, but Middle Eastern food is coming up, but Persian food is still kind of simmering under the surface.
So what we tried to do when we set up the business is we want as many people to have access to Persian food as possible and that’s why we send it directly to people’s homes. But it’s also about them sharing the food. So we make big portions, big Persian-sized portions, because we all know Persian’s eat a lot. You give them small portions. No one’s going to be happy with that. So we make big kind of individual but big portions that people can share. We encourage the culture of sharing around the table and eating together, and it’s so much more than just the food itself and that’s what we try to promote and educate and then we do a lot on the heritage of Persian, just being Persian and the food, obviously, but everything around that and the events around it as well as that. So yeah, i think it’s quite important to pass that message on, but try and kind of break through this whole culture as well as the food itself.
Beata
Yeah, absolutely.
Bita
Yeah, thank you for doing that. It’s really important work and it sounds like also, you know, just fulfilling your passions and your upbringing. But so I’m on the site. something that was interesting to me and it’s sort of like, I guess, a way that someone that’s new to Persian food can select new to Persian. Can you explain then, do you have any advice for someone that maybe is new to Persian food? Like, what do you conceptually think of? You said you’ve been talking a lot about rice, but like, what would be the things, if you’re new to Persian, that you might start with? What would be the things that you might start off with?
Natalie
We basically because I guess in the UK it’s not as prominent as it is in other areas or other countries, say America, Canada or places like that. So I mean, what we’re trying to do with the education wise is bringing especially the British audience into the fold and trying to get them to try something new that they haven’t tried before. So we wanted it to be easy for someone to buy a pack of Persian food or a bundle of Persian food. If you’ve never tried it before, it gives you a little taster of what you have in store. Basically, and in that we’ve got some interesting kind of choices. In that we’ve got some that are more mainstream that would kind of suit a lot of people’s palates, like saffron chicken, which is a bit kind of milder, let’s say. But then we’ve got ghormeh sabzi (herb and bean stew),, because obviously ghormeh sabzi is the king of stews in Persian cuisine. So we wanted to make sure that we’re giving people a mix of a proper taste of Persian food as well as obviously we’ve got rice, but we give like baghali polo and loobia polo and maybe flavors that aren’t too much out of someone’s comfort zone but gives them a good taste into the cuisine and a good way into trying a new food. So that’s the whole concept about the starter pack and the first taste bundle.
The people who haven’t experienced Persian food ever and I guess some people think that Persian food is spicy, so they’ll like relate it to Indian food and say, oh, it’s quite spicy and we’re always trying to say it’s not, it’s well spiced. But it’s not spicy like hot spicy necessarily, it’s just well spiced and you’ve got prominent flavors like saffron in there and some flavors that people have never tried before. So we try and promote all of those flavors as well as easing people in, let’s say, yeah, those are all really good points.
Beata
I mean, i think that when people think about Persian food, you’re right, ghormeh sabzi kind of has to be kind of in that. But it is a pretty strong flavor profile for someone who hasn’t had Persian food. But I love how you have like loobia polo. Lubia polo is the green beans with tomatoes and beef you know different kinds of meat can be used with that.
But I love that because, you’re right, it takes a common ingredient green beans. that is very cross cultural and kind of puts a different spin on it. So it’s not so intimidating for someone who hasn’t had Persian food before.
Natalie
Yeah, exactly, and I guess it’s the same with a lot of dishes. We take a lot of heritage dishes, but we also have some kind of fusion-y twists on dishes as well. So it’s not just heritage dishes that people maybe are a bit more wary of if they haven’t had it before. So we’ve got a mixture of things on the website that would give a hint towards Persian food, but it’s not a fully Persian dish there. But then we’ve also got obviously the heritage side to it. But hence our name Modern Persian Kitchen, because we want to do things slightly different and a bit more modern but we also want to obviously bring in the heritage side of it and the staple kind of dishes the omelettes and carrots and stuff like that, that’s that’s very prominent in Persian cuisine.
Beata
Yeah, sounds like you guys are doing some great things over there and you are a mother of two, you’re running the family business and you have a lot on your plate. How are you juggling all of this? Like I’m definitely taking notes here on how you can, how you’re making it.
Natalie
I don’t sleep basically No, I do sleep. It was hard when, say, Rosa was first born because she’s the second one and so she’s the youngest. It was harder when she was first born to kind of grab time in the day to actually do things, because obviously you’ve got a newborn and then I’ve got a toddler running around. But I did live by literally by the open, the freezer and have dad’s cooking, which was amazing. And I guess that’s why we created the products as well, because they’re there for people like me who have got busy families and busy lives but want to eat healthy and want to have food from your culture. So I lived off dad’s food for a long time but then, once they both started going to nursery, i was able to grab a bit more time and be able to actually work alongside running the family kind of side aspect of it.
But it is difficult, but yeah, I guess these kind of products they’re the way that help you in those aspects, stay calm and also feed the children at the same time, because they eat the same as what I eat. So I mean they eat all of the rice and I mean I haven’t given them all. As I’ve seen it. That would be it. I think that might be a flavor profile too much for the kids.
Beata
But yeah, i don’t know. It sounds like your kids are pretty used to the Persian flavors. They’ll probably gobble it all up oh, they love it.
Natalie
Yeah, my oldest one, lily. She always asks for the rest, so she’s like mommy, the one with the red beans in. I’m like, oh yeah, i love that one. She loves yogurt with rice.
Beata
It’s great aww, that’s the best. Love it, i love it. So this has been really interesting learning about your family business modern Persian kitchen in the UK. It’s so awesome. I’m very jealous. I wish that you guys would have said your delicious food. What looks really delicious food to me in California.
Natalie
I know well if we could and it wouldn’t unfreeze and transit we would. But we do have stuff in the pipeline that maybe is a bit more worldwide. Let’s say I can’t disclose too much, but we do have a line of products that we are developing that hopefully has a wider reach. So that would be good. So we’ll send you some of them when they’re ready?
Beata
Yeah, i’m looking forward to it. So what’s on the horizon for Modern Persian Kitchen? What’s next for you guys? You said there might be something international. Did I hear that there might be a podcast or something coming along?
Natalie
Yeah, so we are developing a podcast. I mean that comes a bit further down the line, probably towards the end of the year, but we are looking into doing a podcast that’s based around like family chats. So they’ve been being mom and dad and then we’re bringing guests. But we’ll be eating around the table while doing the podcast. And it’s again because the family table is basically the key aspect. So it’s not just about the eating, It’s the conversation around the table, it’s it’s the politics, the love around the table, everything that comes with that. So we’ll be bringing our food in and bringing guests in around the table and doing some kind of podcast with that. It’s on the horizon, but it’s coming probably towards the end of the year.
And then, yeah, we have new products that we’re going to be developing and we’re currently developing in the pipeline. I guess it’s more of the community based aspect as well, because that’s a really important aspect for us is the community that we’re building around. So obviously we’re selling food products, but we’re building a community on social and offline also, which is really important to educate, especially in this country where it’s not as prominent. So, yeah, i mean all of those things were kind of taken to the next level and pushing forward with but yeah, exciting stuff, with some new products as well.
Bita
Yeah, you know, our topic here today was kind of blending cultures through food, and I think that you’re really hitting the nail on the head with talking about community and it doesn’t have to be an in-person community, but even a virtual community with like-minded people and and that’s what our goals are too to really build a connection to our listeners and bringing them along in our blended families and life together.
Natalie
Yeah, exactly, and you guys are doing such an amazing job. The community side of it it’s really important and I think, as Iranians, we’re all very passionate and it’s bringing those passions together to be one community. Basically, it’s really lovely. It doesn’t matter. I mean, i’ve got so many friends worldwide in the Persian kind of network scene, which is great, because it’s not just about being here in the UK, just just being around people who are here right now, like you’re saying, virtually and online. It’s really important to to build those connections and have that almost extended family unit. So, yes, i think what the work that you’re doing and the community stuff that we’re doing and other people, it’s just it’s brilliant.
Beata
Thank you so much. Awesome, great well, Natalie jan, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us today. Tell our listeners where can they find you. Where can they find more information about Modern Persian Kitchen?
Natalie
Thank you very much for having me, and so, yeah, you can find us on Instagram at Modern Persian Kitchen. On our website is exactly the same modernpersionkitchen.com. You can find us on there as well TikTok. Wherever. Everything is just Modern Persian Kitchen. So you’ll find us across all of the socials.
Bita
Thank you we hope to join you soon.
Natalie
Great,
Beata
Thank you so much, Natalie joon. Have a great day!
Natalie
You too.
Beata
Thank you. You’ve been listening to the Modern Persian Food podcast with Beta and Beta. Thanks for spending time with us. If you’ve enjoyed what you heard today, consider telling your friend or giving us a good rating. You can subscribe to our show for free on your favorite podcasting app or find us online at ModernPersionFoodcom or on Instagram for the recipes and information we talked about today. We’d love to hear your thoughts and see you next time.
Leave a Reply