Culinary Tales From Balochistan

Nilofer Afridi Qazi

Summary

Travelling solo across Pakistan’s Balochistan province, the author takes us on a wonderful series of journeys. Food as a leitmotif as Balochistan’s north, south and coastal parts are explored.

If ingredients could speak, what would they tell us?

The reader travels through time, with the many faces on offer, humanizing food. These tales engage our senses throughout this adventurous cookbook with each chapter revealing layers of Balochistan.

Many of these recipes are obscure for Pakistanis and are absent from the imagination of what is considered Pakistani food, expanding our understanding of what constitutes the cuisine of the country.

This is a collection of thirteen stories with recipes representing Balochistan’s vast palate documented for the first time.

Biography

Nilofer Afridi Qazi is a public policy specialist with a background in film making. Born in Quetta, Balochistan, she has lived in over a dozen countries as a diplomat’s daughter. The 2005 earthquake in Pakistan brought her back home. In 2012 she began her food mapping adventures across Pakistan’s undocumented culinary landscape. Travelling across Pakistan’s remote corners she spent time with many invisible chefs, unaware of their incredible food as heritage treasures, worthy of acknowledgement and above all celebration. Her work resulted in a documentary series called Pakistan on a Plate. All 53 episodes feature on her YouTube channel, niloferscorner. Culinary Tales from Balochistan is her first book. She currently lives in Islamabad.

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Organiser: SOAS South Asia Institute

Contact email: ssai@soas.ac.uk