On one of her travels to Central Asia, author-historian Salma Yusuf Husain recalls landing in Iran and going in search of biryani. “I was in the city of Isfahan, and we know biryani came to India from Iran. But what I found there in the name of biryani was a large flatbread layered with meat and salad. You see, biriyan means to layer and biryani was originally made with breads in Iran — it became the rice-based dish we know today only when it came to India,” she says.
For those who know the 70-something Husain, or Salma apa as she is affectionately called, documenting Mughal culinary history has been a lifelong passion, although that is not what she originally set out to do.
“My mother wanted me to study Persian, a language she loved, and so I did. After completing my Master’s, I got a job as a Persian translator at the National Archives.” Little did she know this would open many other doors for her.
