Join us on this exciting journey as we kick off our new series that shines a spotlight on Persian food trucks and fast food companies. Our first pit stop is at Tahdig Tacos, a woman-owned business bringing a fusion of Persian and Mexican flavors to Southern California. Listen in as Bayan Ghahramani, the passionate entrepreneur behind this culinary phenomenon, shares her personal journey of identity and culture. Discover how her Persian heritage and Mexican influences inspired the creation of Tahdig Tacos, and how she navigates the challenges and rewards of growing up in cultural diversity.
In this discussion, we further explore the delightful world of Persian cuisine and the concept behind Tahdig Tacos. Get an insider’s view on how these unique tacos are made, the various toppings that can be used, and the array of drinks that pair perfectly with them. Listen in as we discuss how these unique flavors can become a gateway for people to explore more traditional Persian dishes. Whether you’re a food enthusiast or simply someone curious about Persian cuisine, this conversation is sure to leave you hungry for more.
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Transcript/Transcription:
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.
0:00:24 – Beata
Hi everybody, welcome to episode 144 of the Modern Persian Food podcast. We are welcoming you to a new series that we’re starting this summer. I’m super excited about this where we are going to be featuring Persian food trucks and fast food companies bringing people delicious Persian flavors in unexpected places. We are super excited about this series and hopefully you can hit up one of these fun places this summer. We’re going to start off with our first guest from Tahdig Tacos, Bayan Ghahramani. We are so excited to have you on the show, Bayan Joon and you may have guessed it she serves Tahdig Tacos out of her food truck in the Southern California, San Diego area and it looks like you’re expanding a little bit too and Tahdig Tacos is a woman-owned business and she’s making her mark with these delicious hybrid Tahdig and Tacos.
Bayan Joon, thank you so much for joining us today.
Thank you for having me, absolutely, and I’m joined, as always, with my lovely co-host, Bbita. Hi, Bita Joon.
Bita
Hey, ladies, how’s it going?
Beata
Great, thank you.
So, Bayan Joon, you’re combining two of my favorite things Tahdig and Tacos and I’m starstruck a little bit with you because you just seem so cool and I love what you’re doing, and you’re going to have to tell us a little bit about your skating and your moves that you’ve been doing there, but tell us about Tahdig Tacos and what inspired you to do this, and just tell us your story a little bit.
0:01:53 – Bita
I mean, we’ve been drooling and salivating over the images and how mattered. This is just the perfect guest and food topic to talk about Tahdig Tacos. So how’d you get into it?
0:02:07 – Bayan
Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. So Tahdig Tacos started as a project of figuring out myself, like figuring out my identity. I was originally born in Iran, in South of Kermanshah. I was raised in Iran until I was nine and then my mom and I moved to the States, leaving my dad in Iran, and he joined us later, like five, six years later, so growing up in California and going home to a Persian home and going to school to an American school, I always had trouble identifying where I really belong and as I grew up older and I’m not married and I did graduate from SDSU with a communications degree However, I didn’t really utilize my degree to get a quote unquote job. I had started my own insurance agency back in 2015, and I ended up selling the insurance agency and I wanted to get out of that industry and I didn’t know which direction in life I really wanted to go, and it wasn’t really about opening a business to make money. It wasn’t really about like thinking, money, money, money or job, job, job. It was more about figuring out my own identity and that’s where both Persian skater, my other influencer page, and then also Tahdig tacos kind of formed in 2019, where I discovered, you know, I was always too Iranian for my American friends and I was too Americanized, too Khareji for my Persian family or my Persian friends. So I felt like a sense of not belonging and I wanted to figure out who am I and where do I really belong? A lot of people comment like I identify as a Tahdig taco.
I did too, because I’m not Mexican. However, i was raised in Southern California. I’m very familiar with the Mexican culture, with the Spanish culture overall, and I’m also very familiar with my own Persian culture. I’m also Kurdish Iranian, so like to add that to the mix. I also speak Kurdish, and so I’m just a fusion of so many things, and That’s what Tahdig tacos is. It’s a fusion of so many different things, and now we have, like Korean barbecue Tahdig and we have Nutella Tahdig, so it’s really like a mix of the beauty of every culture in one area and just celebrating it all.
0:04:59 – Bita
Wow that’s so beautiful. I have goosebumps. Just preach girl, preach it. You’re telling my story. You’re telling so many people’s story, really the immigrant story for many of us, so beautiful.
0:05:13 – Beata
Yeah, i loved that. Thank you so much for sharing. You know, i hear Bito says that all the time that you know she, when she was growing up, it was like she wasn’t Persian enough and she wasn’t like American enough. and you know, right, when you were saying that, i was just reminded of everything that Bito was saying. I was born here but I definitely had those same feelings too. You know, when you are in from like a Persian family and you want to like keep the traditions and the culture as As part of your own life, yet you’re like living in an environment where there’s so many other influences and you know Your friends and the foods and all of that, so I totally connect and that’s so cool.
So my family is actually from Karaman Shah. Oh really, yeah, oh my gosh, i know. So sweet. and then I love it. and then your last name, karaman. You know, looking at your last name the other day, i was like, oh my god, i love it. It’s such a powerful Name like God Ramon. You know, like what does God Ramon really even mean? It means like champion, champion, right. So like living up to your name.
0:06:10 – Bita
Thank you That is so great.
0:06:12 – Beata
I love it. and then the Kurdish influence. Like, i know this one Kurdish song That my dad would sing to me when we were little and I learned it and I was actually Singing it and my son, he, wasn’t a big fan of it, i do have to say, because it just, you know, some of those songs just have so much passion in it and like the way that you sing it in your voice kind of, so he wasn’t a big fan of it, but that was really special. So thank you for sharing all of that information about your history and you know the influences that kind of made you do it. and then, like 2019, you guys launched, so then the next year was a pandemic, yeah. So I think that, from having a food truck, that’s kind of like a good time to have a food truck, right, because I think everyone was trying to find ways to like eat outside and not have like a traditional restaurant setting, right. So how did you do with that?
0:07:02 – Bayan
and, like you know, we’re in the process where you want to make that happen so I actually had my very first sale as a food tent in January of 2020, 2019. It was more about I call it my scientific project just figuring out how to do what I’m doing. It did take me eight months of sitting in a kitchen and, you know, I wasn’t a chef, nor was I a culinary student or anything like that, so that was all brand new to me, and the funny thing is I actually learned how to make Tahdig, or mass-produced Tahdig, before I learned how to make the stews on the Tahdig, mm-hmm. So basically, like in the pandemic I had just started. So in January, Ii had my first sale. It was very sporadic, too, because I was a food tent, so it wasn’t like every week, four or five days a week, it was like once every two weeks. I would, you know, sign up at a farmers market or something to sell, and at the time I was, you know, fitting all the stuff, like all the propane tanks and the tent and the food and the ice box, like all the different things in my sedan and I was driving it to the location and it didn’t fit, so I had to make two trips. So, oh gosh, every event I did, I had to either ask my stepmom to drive with me at like seven in the morning or I had to start at like five in the morning and make two trips so that I can make sure that I set up on time. So it wasn’t a very like smooth, easy start. It was definitely a lot of struggles and right before the pandemic hit I was ready to give up.
I was just like this is not for me, like the food industry is just not for me. I’m gonna go back to insurance. and I had this gut feeling that I don’t wanna go back to insurance for money, like there’s something speaking to me and I need to keep going. and I was like not sure what to do. and then the pandemic hit and every restaurant closed down for like a month and a half and bars closed down for a month and a half and I had just made the transition from farmers market to breweries so that I could actually keep my stuff there, so I don’t have to travel back and forth with the tent and that I can travel back and forth with the rest of the stuff and I could fit it in one sedan. Although it was like great for me not to move my stuff around the farmers market, I was selling more plates than at a brewery, and so it was just such a struggle and I remember I was telling the bartender that I was ready to give up. and I was just like you know what, if you guys really wanna taste this food, today is your last chance, cause I’m not coming back.
and the pandemic hit and I shut down and I was like, okay, I didn’t know, I had a month and a half, but during that month and a half I was like what am I gonna do? If I don’t do this? where am I gonna go? and so I was searching again and they called me at the brewery and they were like, hey, all of our food vendors have canceled on us and the CDC is telling us that the only way we can open up our bar is if we have food on the same tab. So I was wondering is if we can, instead of having you show up one day a week, on Thursday, on our slowest day of the week, we can have you show up four days a week, and we need you to at least show up with 100 plates a day so we can extend the time that we’re open.
0:10:54 – Bita
Wow, that was your opportunity to jump.
Bayan
That was it, that was my opportunity to jump.
0:10:59 – Beata
I mean, it came docking on your door, yeah, and so I was like, okay, i’m in.
0:11:04 – Bayan
and all the other food vendors didn’t wanna take it because of tax purposes and write-offs and whatever, and I didn’t care. I was like I’m in.
0:11:12 – Bita
It’s complicated, but sounds like it was the right time for you.
0:11:16 – Bayan
It was, and even originally, when I had thought about the next business I’m getting into. I always like to read like a dummies book of the business. So I read Food Truck for Dummies and literally in the first two pages it was like the food truck industry started and like boomed in the Great Depression. So yeah, and I was coming from the insurance industry, So I’m over here selling life insurance, letting people know like hey, you gotta watch the media.
If the media is telling you we’re at all times high, we’re about to hit all times low, so you better get your life insurance right now, because if we hit an all times low, then there’s a lot of problems that could come with it and you want to like jump at this opportunity. and so I’m watching the markets. You know, Trump is president, we’re at all times high, all times high. I’m thinking we’re about to hit all times low in the next three years. So do I wanna get back in the insurance industry or do I wanna get in an industry that can thrive at an all times low, which is the food truck industry? So my brain was like I’m not gonna do a restaurant because that’s not who was thriving. It was the food truck industry that was thriving. So I was like moving with calculated risk at the same time, just jumping all in and just like going like, okay, we’re gonna do what we can with what we have. So, yeah, that’s how I started and that’s what got me in like the door.
0:12:51 – Beata
Yeah, and perfect for like a brewery too, because you know you can pair your food with like drinks too and you don’t have to worry about it from your standpoint, and great for them for making such a smart move to inviting you to come on board. Thank you,
Hi friends, jumping in to let you know that we’re doing a listener survey this month and we’d love to get your input. It’s only 10 questions long and it’ll give you a chance to not only let us know how we’re doing, but what type of content you want to hear from us in the future. It’s on our website, modernpersionfoodcom, our Instagram handle, modern Persian Food, and we’ll include the link in our newsletter too. Thank you so much for being part of our journey. Now back to the show.
0:13:33 – Bita
We have a couple of restaurants and you probably have tons of them in Southern California that serve a small quantity of tahdig with khoresht on top as an appetizer, and you know typically at least the ones I’ve been to it’s ghormeh sabzi or a ghehmeh on top of the tahdig. So I have yet to experience and taste one of your actual Tahdig tacos. How is what you’re doing different from, say, a restaurant that is giving a little bit of a sampler plate as an appetizer of Tahdig with khoresh on top?
0:14:06 – Bayan
So the idea behind Tahdig tacos is not to just serve Persian food. It’s to allow non-Iranians to experience Persian cuisine in a way that they’re not hesitant to. So, growing up, i’ve had a lot of American friends and without me, taking them to a Persian restaurant, reading the menu, explaining page by page what everything means and letting them open up, not be fearful of ordering things they’re unfamiliar with, and then probably ending up getting the kabab because that’s the safest bet. I wanted to showcase everything else we have in a way that takes away the hesitancy or the friction of wanting to order something like ghormeh sabzi or fesenjoon or ghemeh. An Iranian might go to a restaurant and order that on the side. We know what it is, we die for it, we love it and we’ll order it. However, there is restaurants all over the world. There’s sushi. I would never eat raw fish until somebody introduced me to sushi and now it’s like a once a week I must have sushi.
Bita
Good point, yeah.
Beata
Good reference, yeah.
Bayan
So it was something that I wanted to showcase Iranian food in a way that opens people up.
So Tahdig tacos serves Tahdig with khoresh. Yes, we also have Tahdig with carne asada. We also have Tahdig with Korean barbecue. So when I’m at a brewery and somebody who’s never been introduced to Persian food comes to my food truck, they’re open to at least eating something from my food truck. and then when they have the food and they’re like, wow, what was that crispy stuff that was so good. That opens the door for me to be able to explain who Persians are, what all this means. and more often than not they will come back after they’ve had the carne asada and say you know what, let me get the gamut too Like I want to taste like a full experience of Persian food, and that’s when they are now open to eating Persian food outside of Tahdig tacos, wherever they are.
0:16:22 – Beata
and that was like the goal, yeah absolutely, and it feels so good to open someone’s eyes to Persian food especially, or just having to be able to experience it. and can you describe it? I mean, i could describe it, but I would love for you to describe it. Can you just walk us through what to expect when you get a Tahdig taco? So if we can help people visualize what it looks like, sure, yes, so Tahdig.
0:16:46 – Bayan
If you want to translate it word for word, Tahdig means bottom and Dig means pot. Tahdig means bottom of the pot, and whenever we make rice in the Persian culture, we boil the rice with water in it until the rice has gotten longer, and then, once it’s gone through that process, we strain it and we pour cold water over it to stop the cooking process completely. and what we do is we put oil at the bottom of the pot. and When we put oil at the bottom of the pot, we can put anything. We could put the rice right back in. I put lavash, so it’s flatbread.
You can also do corn tortilla if you want it gluten-free. You can do potatoes if that’s what you like. There’s cultures that do greens, like spinach or other types of like vegetables. You could do fruits, you can do whatever you want, and what happens istThe oil is going to fry the bottom while you pour the rice back in, and that is what gets steamed. So then what happens is you have the steamed rice stuck to the fried. Whatever you have, for my case, is lavash, and that gives it two. consistencies at one time, with every bite, you have a soft and a hard shell together, and that is what we’re obsessed over is that feeling of like crispy and steamed, and then you can top that with anything you want and it’ll taste delicious.
0:18:15 – Bita
Does your teddy have a little bit of rice too? Is it just the bread?
Bayan
Yes it has a little bit of rice with the tahdig too.
Bita
and do you also infuse with saffron? Do you have the aromatics of saffron, or is it yours, more plain version?
0:18:27 – Bayan
Not in my tahdig. No, I don’t have saffron in my tahdig. I do have saffron lemonade that I serve on my food truck.
0:18:34 – Bita
Oh cool.
0:18:34 – Beata
Okay, yeah, I noticed your drinks. So I saw the saffron lemonade that you had like a rose water version. Yes, and here you have sour cherry. Yes, one too, so those are all so fine, I love that, I love those hybrids, and they all have
Bayan
Oh, they all have saffron.
0:18:50 – Bita
Yes, good mixers too. Yes, they are.
0:18:54 – Beata
Yeah, exactly, spike it with something and you have like the traditional, like warm ghormeh sabzi and Reime and fesenjoonn. So I love that that was explained really nicely how you were saying, for someone who may not be familiar with it, to like take like something like carne, asada or Korean barbecue and put it inside the tahdig, so that being kind of really experience it and it could be a good way to kind of introduce them to like going to the other Persian flavors, and vice versa.
0:19:20 – Bayan
I’m also introducing, like traditional Iranians, to non-traditional concepts. Somebody who is raised here and likes to put hot sauce on everything might go ahead and put hot sauce on their ghormeh sabzi. Yes, and I am getting absolutely cussed out on my page because I’m posting about it and sharing it by the traditional Iranians. and what I love is when those traditional Iranians show up and they’re just super hesitant in getting the carne asada, the Korean barbecue or the Nutella, and they usually order, like you know, two ghormeh sabzis to fish and fesenjoon and then they’re like I guess we’ll get one carne asada and then, like normally, they come back and they’re like lLet’s get two more carne asada.
0:20:16 – Beata
Wow, well, they’re getting a feast, haters are gonna hate, haters are gonna hate.
0:20:21 – Bita
You’re always gonna have those people, but for every one of those, you’ll have 10 more that are coming back for seconds. So,”breekhalah” (good job), i’m super proud of you.
0:20:29 – Beata
Yeah, yeah, i’m proud of you too, and even though this is the first time I’m meeting you, I’mi’m so excited for what you’ve done and You know, tell us a little bit about, like your skater side. I see you on roller skates and you like have some moves down. Can you tell us a little bit about that, where that come from and what you?
0:20:46 – Bayan
So there, yeah, so skating is my therapy, so that’s my way of releasing energy. I’m a very high energy person and as a high energy person, sometimes I wake up early in the morning with a lot of anxiety and if I don’t do something about it, like exercise or something it could build into like I can get nauseous and it causes a lot of physical pain. Skating is my way of releasing and I do that every single morning when I wake up. My first gift to myself in the day is giving myself time and allowing myself to.
I listen to like Mahasti and Haydn, like very classical, like Persian music, because that’s what my mom used to sing to me as a child. So that’s like another form of therapy and like dancing by the beach and like by the water. It’s like taking in the fresh air at like five in the morning, six in the morning. That’s my skating side. and then, of course, like the idea of skating actually really originated from me going to car shows, so I roller skate at low rider car cruises, so I do modeling and everything with them. That’s how I’m super involved in the Hispanic culture. They have car cruises all over California. Actually, they’re just starting out now that it’s May and summertime, so they bring out like these cars that hop and they do all these cool things with them and they’re super fun colors and so I go and I skate there and yeah, that’s my skate side, yeah, that’s so cool.
0:22:21 – Beata
I love it. and are they the old school skates or inline skates,?
0:22:24 – Bayan
old school skates yeah, they’re like for the quad skates.
0:22:30 – Beata
I love it
When you said your first gift to yourself in the morning. I love that. I’m going to have to, like, tap into something that I gift myself with every morning too. That’s really great. That’s really great Just taking a little bit out of time for yourself. What a good message. That is a really good message. So where can people find you? Tell us where they can learn more information, how they can get this awesome Tahdig Taco, a sampling of it?
0:22:55 – Bayan
So TahdigTacoscom.
There’s a calendar on TahdigTacoscom and there’s also my socials are linked on there to find me on Instagram or TikTok. My Instagram handle is TahdigTacosOfficial and on my skate side, persianSkater, is my handle on Instagram and TikTok as well. and then I just recently opened a foodie page where I’m showcasing other food trucks and restaurants. It’s called FoodieSkater, so I roller skated into different restaurants. I just opened that page. I have, like, I think, 176 followers so far and just sharing like food places here in Southern California and Las Vegas.
0:23:39 – Bita
That’s amazing. Tell us the name of that again
0:23:40 – Bayan
FoodieSkater.
PersianSkater and TahdigTacos official. That’s awesome.
0:23:44 – Beata
Love it. Great Bayan Joon. We love hearing your story. Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us today. We will link to your handles in our show notes so people can come out and find you and taste some of the delicious stuff that you’re serving up. What’s next for you? Are you going to stay local to the Southern California area? You can franchise out. Do you know what you want to do for the next steps?
0:24:06 – Bayan
I definitely would love to expand worldwide. That’s definitely been the dream from the get go. There are some things in the work right now and I will be announcing new things in the next few months. So if you follow and follow along my journey, you’ll find out that there’s like a few different good news coming.
0:24:27 – Beata
Great, awesome, well, as Bita joon said Mobarak Basha and Barikhalah. Thank you, Byan joon and MoBarak Basha, for everything. Best wishes to you and for your future.
0:24:37 – Bayan
I appreciate you guys. Thank you for having me, and this conversation has been very fulfilling and I really am grateful to meet both of you, even if it’s virtual. I hope I get to meet you and give you a hug in person soon too.
0:24:50 – Beata
Yay, I hope so too,
Bita
Likewise Great Thanks again Bayan joon
0:24:55 – Bayan
thank you
Bye,
till next time.
Bye.
0:25:01 – Beata
You’ve been listening to the Modern Persian Food podcast with Bita and Bita. 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.
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