One Chef Is Keeping Afghan Culture Alive in London
As the Taliban tightens control at home, Mursal Saiq is using food to reclaim culture, language, and voice for a silenced generation.
Bar Ninety-One, nestled in the heart of East London’s iconic Truman Brewery off Brick Lane, isn’t the first place one would imagine hosting an Afghan-themed evening. Yet here we are, 70 diners squeezed together at long tables, our mouths watering as the tantalizing aromas of Afghan cuisine fill the air.
At the center of it all stands Mursal Saiq, a petite, 32-year-old British-Afghan with a black tattoo of her name in Farsi across her chest. It’s bold and unapologetic, just like Saiq. “Until Afghan women get their voices back, we’re their voices. We have to be louder,” she says. For this raven-haired chef, Afghan Nights isn’t just a supper club. It is defiance served over three courses.
Since the Taliban’s return to power in the summer of 2021, not only have they erased women from public life, but they’ve also pursued a policy of eradicating Persian in the country, instead favoring Pashto, their native language.
Saiq’s tattoo, therefore, was a big fuck you to them.
“As a country, you can lose land. But you only really lose when you lose your sense of identity and history. I need us to preserve our history.” Born during the first Taliban rule in the 90s, Saiq grew up as the middle child in a family of six children. They fled the civil war for Mumbai, India, where Saiq fell in love with the country’s rich festivals and traditions.
“We celebrated Diwali and Holi, watching all those colors, and eating sweets,” she smiles.
India was also a creative inspiration, its rich food and spices leaving a lasting imprint on her palate and imagination.
Saiq’s uncle worked in Bollywood, the Hindi-language film industry. She grins when she tells me about meeting superstar Amitabh Bachchan.
When she was nine, they left for the UK. Saiq and her mother were separated from half the family, which left the chef with immense trauma that she still struggles to talk about today.
Then there was the racism. North London, at that time, was still hostile to some ethnic minorities. “Me and my brother were around nine or 10 and had rocks thrown at us,” says Saiq. “My black friend, Deb, said, ‘This happens to us every day.’”
Saiq’s first memory of food is white rice served with lubya kidney beans, a “peasant dish” from northern Afghanistan. It was comfort food. “When I took it to school for lunch, the girls said, ‘Ew, what’s that?’” For a while, she rejected the dish that had once soothed her. “As a young ethnic child, it’s difficult to be yourself and to love your food.” Years later, she found her way back. It is now her favorite again.
When her father eventually joined them with the rest of her siblings, the family moved to Hackney in east London. There, she found something different: a place where people from different cultures could all celebrate their differences. “Before, our food was smelly and disgusting, but here it was celebrated. We could wear our traditional clothes. Hackney taught me about integration.”
Returning to Afghanistan for holidays in the 2000s, after the Western invasion had ousted the Taliban, Saiq naively thought she was going home. “When you’re in a foreign country, you usually don’t understand the language, but this wasn’t the case here. I thought, this is another part of me.” Yet, ironically, the locals called her “English girl.”
Between Kabul and London, she realized she belonged fully to neither. “We are called traitors for leaving. Your entire existence feels guilt for leaving. People say to me, you don’t look religious, but I do pray. First, I rebelled against the Taliban and then against the West.”
Instead, Saiq found clarity in food.
After studying history and political philosophy at Goldsmiths College, she worked at the British Museum as an archivist by day. In the evenings and at weekends, she joined Street Feast, learning barbecue craft. But there was just one niggle. The food wasn’t halal or vegetarian. “None of my family and friends could eat it.”
Determined to include her loved ones in her cuisine, she and her partner, chef Josh Moroney—who is of mixed English-Guyanese heritage—founded Cue Point, a British-Afghan smokehouse that blends Afghan flavors with traditional barbecue techniques.
From the outset, they committed to halal and vegan menus. They wanted to reflect Hackney’s diversity in their food and make sure as many people as possible could eat it without feeling left out. Saiq even travelled to the US to compete for Britain in the World Food Championships, where she came second.
Back at Kabul Nights, some diners come for nostalgia, others for politics. Many arrive simply for good food—of which there is plenty. Afghan cuisine is a rich blend of South Asian, Central Asian, and Middle Eastern food.
The first dish is mantu, dumplings stuffed with slow-smoked brisket and garlic yogurt, topped with lentils. The vegan version omits the beef in favor of leeks and onions.
The music comes from Yaz Fentazi on the oud and Samir Nacer on the darbuka, their melodies and drumbeats mixing with the sounds of laughter and conversation.
One diner, named Tia, recalls fondly her time working at a radio station in Afghanistan. “Afghans are the most magical people I’ve met,” she smiles. “I remember seeing men who used to listen to the radio in secret—they’d stick their heads out of the window while wearing earphones, so that the Taliban wouldn’t catch them.”
Laila, a young Afghan woman of Pashtun and Tajik heritage, has brought her English partner. “I feel seen by what Mursal is doing here,” she says, as we tuck into Saiq’s take on the Kabuli pulao, a meaty aromatic rice dish mixed with carrots, raisins, and toasted cashews. The borani banjan, a slow-cooked creamy, tangy eggplant dish with yogurt, is comforting on this rainy night.
Dessert is a mouthwatering caramel-and-pistachio cake.
Laila’s smile falters as she recalls how her mother was smacked by a Taliban member for wearing white shoes in public, her father beaten for listening to the radio and not growing a beard.
“I’m angry at the women’s rights activists who don’t raise their voice for Afghans,” she says, betrayed by the western intervention which did, briefly, lead to some meaningful changes in the central Asian country.
Afghan women made advancements in education, employment, and health care, and were even represented in government. The 2004 constitution guaranteed equal rights for all citizens, including ethnic and religious minorities. That all changed when the Taliban returned to power.
Now, says Saiq, there’s a sense things are worse with the “Taliban 2.0”, because “Afghans had that taste of freedom.” A generation learned to dream. Not anymore.
“When the Taliban took over, I felt trapped and lost. I wasn’t sure how to celebrate our culture because I’m also not traditional,” says Saiq. “Someone told me that she doesn’t go to Afghan events because she feels like she doesn’t belong.” Afghan Nights, therefore, is a place for the lost souls who are caught between two cultures and countries.
There is a pause between courses, as some Persian poetry is read on stage. One is Saiq’s cousin, Bazil, the other a young woman named Rokhsar, who recites the words in English as well as Farsi. In a city thousands of miles from Kabul, Persian flows freely and defiantly, far from the eyes and ears of the Taliban.
For this is what Afghan Nights really serves: not just delicious cuisine but language, culture, and shared memories. It’s a space where those who have been silenced are given a voice here in London.
“I feel like the Taliban is my personal enemy,” says Saiq. “The more they do, the more I act.”
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