by Jen Lin-Liu
I had noodles on only a few other occasions in Iran. At the teahouse on our first night in Mashhad, tagliatelle-like strands were tossed with butter and flecks of basil, a minor side dish among many. In the friendly desert oasis of Yazd, Craig and I had tried a Persian version of spaghetti Bolognese, a lackluster dish made of minced lamb, tomato paste, and boiled dry noodles. And toward the end of my week with the Soltanis, after the mother had enthusiastically showed me a multitude of stews and rice dishes, she reluctantly agreed to have her assistant show me a vermicelli dish. Into a pressure cooker the assistant threw sliced carrots, lentils, a large hunk of chicken, a knob of butter, and a spoonful of tomato paste. She added a quart of water and sealed the lid. After the soup had cooked for forty-five minutes, she added salt, pepper, a squeeze of lemon, and a package of vermicelli, and closed the lid to cook for another fifteen minutes. The result was only slightly more appetizing than the teahouse’s ash-e-reshteh.
Some experts claimed Persians had invented noodles and they’d dispersed in either direction, but I was disinclined to believe this after I’d spent time in Iran and researched it further. While some Iranians like Mr. Sanjar held fast to the claim, others like the Soltanis believed the conventional wisdom that noodles had been invented in China.
There is evidence, though, that noodles have long been an important part of Persian cuisine. The Iranian-American author Najmieh Batmanglij writes in her cookbook Food of Life, “It is customary to eat noodles before embarking on something new.” The food symbolizes “the path among the many that life spreads out before us” and “can bring good fortune and make new endeavors fruitful.” Iranians often eat noodles on Nowruz, the Persian New Year, and just before or after loved ones leave on journeys. Rather than a dish of greeting, like plov, it seemed noodles were a way of saying good-bye and good luck.
Ash, a word that refers to soup or noodles, began appearing in Persian poems as early as the ninth century, but it was unclear which the poets were referring to. One of the first concrete mentions of noodles appeared during the Ghaznavid Dynasty, an empire that covered much of modern-day Iran, Central Asia, and northern India and lasted from the tenth to the twelfth centuries. The Chronicle of Beihaghi records an instance of the sultan Mahmud of Ghazni ordering royal cooks to make ash-e-lakhshak (old Persian for ash-e-reshteh) for the poor. Ash, not coincidentally, is also a word for noodles in Central Asia—witness the two-noodle ashlyanfu I’d encountered in Kyrgyzstan. (So important was ash that the word for “cook” throughout Central Asia and Iran was ashpez or oshpez.)
But it seems that noodles diminished in importance as rice began gaining prominence, sometime in the fourteenth century. A century later, the Persian poet Boshaq al-Atameh described in a lengthy work how saffron rice battled noodles and won. And somewhere in my travels between Central Asia and Iran, the Central Asian noodle dishes that reminded me of Chinese ones—dishes like laghman (hand-pulled noodles) and manpar (noodle squares) had disappeared. Iranians told me that Azeris, an ethnic Turkic group in Iran, ate dumplings, but outside of that community, nary a dumpling did I see throughout my visit. Some older Iranians remembered their families making and eating noodles at home in their childhood; Shirin, our tour guide at the Imam Reza shrine, had told me that her grandmother hired a noodle craftsman to come to her village. But all that was left in Iran when I arrived were a few lackluster dishes that employed factory-produced vermicelli.
Fortunately, the delicious rice dishes I ate at the Soltanis and elsewhere in Iran made up for the dearth of noodles. Aside from tah-cheen, the crusty cake of rice, chicken, and barberries, Mrs. Soltani taught me bagholi polow, a pilaf of fresh dill and fava beans. As the chefs before her had done, she carefully rinsed, soaked, and parboiled a batch of rice. She placed a layer of potato slices in a stockpot slicked lightly with oil and added the parboiled rice. She added fresh dill and fava beans, dousing the mixture liberally with butter before adding a splash of saffron water. She steamed the polow for forty-five minutes. Once it was done, she inverted the pot onto a heavy plate, gave the pot a hard whack, and a crusty mound of pilaf tumbled out. The polow had the perfect tah-dig, the golden crust that formed around the bottom of the pot.
Tah-dig was the measure by which Iranian cooks were judged. The key was to begin with a generous layer of oil in the pot before placing a layer of potatoes, lavash, or rice mixed with yogurt and eggs (as with tah-cheen). Mrs. Soltani packed the rice down firmly, before adding a bit of water and heating the pot over a very low fire until most of the moisture had slowly evaporated. When the tah-dig was done, it was deep golden, never dark or scorched, and it made a gratifying crunch when you bit into it.
Along with this delicious polow, I tasted a vast array of pilafs across the country; chefs imbued them with candied orange peel, pistachios, and almond slivers; sour cherry jam and chicken; yellow split peas, lime powder, and lamb. After the monotony of Central Asian plov, tasting the variety of polows in Iran was like going from black and white to Technicolor. And while rice was central to Persian meals, the khoreshts, or braises, that accompanied them were also important. Achieving the right balance of sweet and sour in the khoreshts was key. Many stews were flavored with a spice mix that included ground turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, and cumin. The Soltanis and other chefs used an array of souring agents that included powdered dried limes, kashkt (dried yogurt), lemon, and sumac. The sweetness was provided by dried fruits, sugar, grape molasses (which I’d also seen in Xinjiang), or pomegranates (an ingredient I’d encounter again farther west).
Despite the dominance of meat, vegetables were more varied and interesting in Iran than I’d encountered elsewhere on my journey. In addition to the fresh herbs that came with the bread and cheese at the beginning of meals and the slices of tomato and cucumber that often accompanied kebabs, Iranians had a special fondness for eggplant. In kashkt badenjum, it was simmered and flavored with ground lamb, onions, and dried yogurt. Occasionally I came across dolmas, the stuffed vegetables or grape leaves that spanned from Central Asia to the Mediterranean, and kukus, omelet-like dishes imbued with leafy greens or fava beans. But in general, vegetarians like Koshan had a difficult time in Iran.
Mrs. Soltani also taught me the importance of saffron, which she used liberally, despite the cost—she went through about a hundred dollars of the spice every month. She ground the red threads in a mortar, transferred the powder to a small glass, and added a thimble of hot water, keeping the saffron close at hand during classes. One afternoon, after making the delicious dill-and-fava-bean rice pilaf, Mrs. Soltani took out a few chicken breasts. Salivating, I asked Yasmin what was next.
She paused, searching for the right name. “Do you know KFC?” she asked.
“Fried chicken?” I replied. She nodded and smiled. It proved to be fried chicken, indeed, but the Colonel never put saffron in his secret recipe, I guarantee.
• • •
While I was in cooking classes at the Soltanis’, Craig was often on his own. Sometimes he stayed in the hotel and read, but as Mr. Sanjar left him to his own devices, apparently having ascertained that we were not national security threats, Craig began taking long walks and visiting teahouses. In the evenings, he joined me, and I was grateful that the Soltanis included him in our after-class plans.
On the evening the Soltanis’ son, Shaheen, had suggested for dinner, I finished my cooking lessons for the day and awaited Craig’s arrival. Mrs. Soltani, Yasmin, and two cooking assistants sat in front of a large flat-screen television that beamed soap operas, talk shows, and music videos from around the world—but not, I noticed, the BBC or CNN. While the others chatted and watched a Latin American soap opera, Mrs. Soltani crossed her legs on a chair pointed toward Mecca and wrapped a flowery white chador over her head. With her hands grasping the cloth under her chin, she began her namaz, or prayers. She mouthed long verses from the Koran and occasionally touched her forehead to a special prayer tile in her lap. While devout Shias
prayed three times a day, fewer than the five times that Sunnis prayed, Mrs. Soltani pared down her sessions to once a day.
I asked Yasmin about the family’s beliefs. They were divided, she said. While she and her mother were mildly religious, her father and brother were outright atheists. Like her mother, Yasmin prayed every day, though her beliefs weren’t as strong since she’d graduated from college. “Praying for me is more of a ritual, a way of giving appreciation to my family,” she said.
After Mrs. Soltani finished her prayers, she and Yasmin closed up the cooking school. Yasmin donned a black head scarf and trench coat and left for French class, which she attended several evenings each week. I followed Mrs. Soltani downstairs, to the family’s comfortable home. The living room was filled with a fancy sofa and a European dining set, the brand-new chairs still covered in plastic. Mr. Soltani was watching the news. He rose to greet me, and Shaheen got up from a bar stool in the kitchen, where he’d been sitting elbow to elbow with Craig. A haze of cigarette smoke engulfed them. Sporting fancy athletic wear and a gelled hairdo, Shaheen looked just as Westernized and trendy as his sister. He’d told Craig that we were the first Americans he’d ever met in the flesh and that he’d planned for this evening since he’d heard we were coming. His enthusiasm was a little unnerving and awkward, making us feel like celebrities before an adoring fan.
“What would you lack to drink?” he asked me with an unmistakable Southern twang, which he explained he’d picked up from a local English teacher, an Iranian who’d spent time in Georgia.
Craig was drinking Heineken, which Shaheen had purchased illegally for seven dollars a can. But I was more curious about another drink he offered—arrack, a clear liquor that ethnic Armenians bootlegged in their homes and sold in water bottles, for twenty dollars each. I’m practically a teetotaler because I have a low tolerance and enjoy only the taste of wine. In Xinjiang, I’d avoided the beer, and in Central Asia I’d dodged the koumiss and vodka. In the southern Iranian town of Shiraz, where the grape of the same name originated, Mr. Sanjar had offered to procure wine, but we declined, thinking it best not to buy from him. He’d noted that Persians drank liquor for centuries before the fundamentalists came to power in 1979. (That information, along with the admission that he’d consumed pork and wine in Italy, were the only times he broke with official dogma.) In his travelogue, Marco Polo noted how Persians of his own time had evaded the Islamic ban on liquor: “They quiet their consciences on this point by persuading themselves that if they take the precaution of boiling it over the fire . . . they may drink it without infringing the commandment.”
Somehow, though, the ban on alcohol made the prospect of a drink at the Soltanis’ more appealing. Shaheen bounded to the fridge, dispensed ice cubes into a glass with the same comforting crushing sound I’d heard in my own home, and poured in the clear arrack. With its distinct anise aroma reminiscent of Greek ouzo, this was a drink I would see in various incarnations farther west.
Mrs. Soltani wrinkled her nose as she strolled into the kitchen, coughing and waving her hand to disperse the smoke. We asked Shaheen if it was okay to drink in the house—as if there was anywhere else we could do it.
“It’s fahne, it’s fahne!” Shaheen said, pointing to a glass of arrack and 7UP his father had just poured for himself. “Y’see? Ma father, very soon, will drink from this cu-up.”
Meanwhile, an image of President Ahmadinejad flashed on the news, prompting Shaheen to launch into a tirade.
“We have no freedom in this countray,” he said, working through his third glass of arrack. With the Southern accent, he was beginning to sound like none other than our former president George W. Bush. “No freedom of thought, no freedom of action. We can’t do anythang in this countray!” I almost expected him to declare his homeland part of the “Axis of Evil.”
Because of the restrictions, Shaheen said he wanted to leave Iran, maybe go to Australia. It was the first time we’d heard complaints about the government so candidly spouted, though we later learned that, for many Iranians, these sentiments hovered just below the surface. To be sure, the president had support—his redistribution of wealth, adherence to strict Islamic values, and nationalistic rhetoric appealed to some. But that was not Shaheen nor the rest of his family, he explained. He was getting more worked up by the minute, denouncing the president and railing against the ayatollahs and the mullahs, the religious clerics who enforced sharia, religious law. “I hate mullahs!” he proclaimed. He dashed into his bedroom to retrieve a document and proceeded to read it aloud in his wobbly, Southern-tinged English, elongating his vowels with wild abandon. The paper sounded like it had come from some anti-Muslim lobby outside of Iran.
“Where did you find this?” I asked.
On a forbidden website, he said, adding that he easily circumvented Iran’s firewall through a proxy server.
If Shaheen was any indication, the Iranian government was in serious trouble. His voice contained an almost uncontrollable rage. Listening to him reminded me of the deadly protests that had broken out in Tehran the previous year. They would erupt again, not long after we departed Iran, riding an “Arab Spring” of revolts in nearby countries.
But for the moment, the pressing question was: where would we lack to eat? Shaheen wanted to get in his car and head out for the night.
We’d just eaten upstairs in the cooking school, I protested, and there were so many snacks sitting before us—the kitchen counter was littered with pomegranates, grapes, sunflower seeds, and peanuts.
“But this isn’t dinner,” Shaheen said. “We must have dinner.”
Craig and I looked at each other, both of us thinking the same thing. If it was illegal to drink, wouldn’t it be doubly illegal to drink and drive?
“Don’t be silly,” Shaheen said. “I must, must take you out for dinner!”
But what about his parents? Wouldn’t they worry about us?
Shaheen crossed his arms and said he was simply not going to take no for an answer. He’d been planning this since he’d heard we were coming!
We looked over at Mr. Soltani. He nodded passively and told us to have a good time. Mrs. Soltani had disappeared back upstairs to watch her soap operas. We hesitantly got into Shaheen’s spacious new Hyundai sedan and he drove us to a pizzeria, which was fortunately just a few blocks away. It reminded me of the fake Pizza Hut in Central Asia, and the bland pies and uninspired salad bar paled in comparison to the food his mother cooked. Instead of beer or arrack, we drank cherry sharbat, a drink that was usually made from stewed fresh fruit but at the pizzeria came out of a fountain dispenser. Women, adjusting their head scarves occasionally, sat stiffly with their children and husbands. We stuck to safe conversation. Shaheen professed a love for Iranian poetry, promising Craig a volume by Hafez, his favorite poet, whose tomb we’d visited earlier in our trip. He also talked about soccer and his job as an engineer, constantly fidgeting and getting up for more sharbat. We argued over the bill. Shaheen prevailed, then announced that he would drive us back to our hotel.
But we could take a taxi, I protested as we got up to leave.
Shaheen stopped in his tracks and looked at me incredulously. “It is mah duty to drive you home!” he exclaimed.
As we drove through the dark streets, he turned up the stereo full-blast and sang along off-key to Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive.” Approaching a narrow alley near the hotel, we asked him to stop by the side of the road—we could walk the rest of the way. But he wouldn’t hear of it. “It’s not too narrow! Don’t tell me such a thang!” He slowly coasted down the tight street and deposited us at the front door of our hotel. We breathed a sigh of relief when we got to our room.
• • •
Along the Silk Road, we’d seen how deeply Western fast food had penetrated far-flung cultures. But Iran’s obsession with hamburgers and pizza surpassed its neighbors’ and possibly even America’s. The pizza joint t
hat Shaheen had taken us to was one of hundreds in Iran, places as common as kebab shops and bakeries. With no international chains allowed to operate in Iran, small-time entrepreneurs made a lucrative business out of fast food. In Shiraz, we’d ventured into a restaurant called Pizza Hamburger 101 to see what the fuss was about. We sat down to a spongy pie topped with limp, tasteless cheese and fake ham. The tomato sauce was simply ketchup, which diners squeezed from plastic packets onto the finished product.
In Esfahan, after a long stretch of enjoying kebabs and khoreshts, Craig had gotten a hamburger craving. “I hear they have good burgers,” he said of a nearby hotel restaurant, though he couldn’t remember who’d told him. I agreed, a little grudgingly, but figured I’d order a Persian meal while he took care of his craving. But when we sat down and unfolded the menus, I balked—the restaurant served only Western food.
If we had to eat Western, I insisted we find something local. Craig was hungry and didn’t want to spend time wandering around looking for food. It could, after all, take hours when I was involved. And he’d been eating stews and rice for weeks, he added. Why not go for a little variety? But I was writing a book about food, I argued back, and I wasn’t going to write about a dismal hotel meal.
Craig acquiesced reluctantly, and we returned to the streets. There were plenty of pizza and hamburger joints, of course, but I couldn’t bring myself to enter one. Finally, we found a place selling kebab sandwiches that seemed sufficiently Iranian. Craig grumbled as we ate chicken kebab sandwiches slathered with Thousand Island dressing. He was right to complain. The meal was disgusting.