Podcast check.
Check, Solomon right.
Can you talk into this microphone please?
Okay excellent, it sounds like it's working.
How old are you?
Nine, Nine and a half.
Nine and a half.
Oh.
So where are we right now?
We're in the Afghan Village.
Afghan Village restaurant?
Yeah.
You have a family connection to this restaurant.
Yeah.
Your dad is the owner.
Yeah.
What's your favorite thing on the menu?
My favorite thing is chocolate kebab.
Oh, chocolate kebab.
My favorite job is to cook bread and chocolate kebab.
Oh, you cook the chocolate kebabs?
Yeah.
Wow.
You think someday you'll be the head chef of this restaurant?
Yeah.
That'd be cool.
Chocolate kebabs for everyone.
This is The Sporkful.
It's not for foodies.
It's for eaters.
I'm Dan Pashman.
Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people.
In 2021, American troops withdrew from Afghanistan after a 20 year war there.
Within days, the Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban took control.
There was a massive evacuation.
American troops, defense contractors and about 75000 Afghans who felt their lives would be in danger if they stayed.
Since then, roughly 200000 immigrants and refugees from Afghanistan have come to the US, and a lot of them have resettled in the greater Houston area.
In fact, Houston has taken in more evacuees than any other American city.
When refugees are resettled in the U.S., the government has certain guidelines.
One is that new arrivals should get a culturally appropriate meal within their first 24 hours in the country.
And that is how a lot of newcomers end up at a restaurant in Houston called the Afghan Village.
They come here straight from the airport.
They meet me and they feel good.
I think it's just cultural because they haven't seen Afghans in a while.
And all of a sudden they meet somebody from their culture who speak the language.
So they feel very good, very comfortable.
And yes, they come often.
They come often.
This is Omar Yousafzai.
He's the father of Solomon, who you heard at the start of the show.
And he's the owner of the Afghan Village restaurant.
Afghan Village sits in a strip mall between an Afghan grocery and an Afghan gift shop, both of which Omar also owns.
They're in a neighborhood of Houston that people have started calling Jalalabad after the city in eastern Afghanistan.
The inside of the restaurant has a drop ceiling, tile floors, tables and chairs that would look at home in a diner, and Afghan and American flags on the walls.
On one side there's an elevated platform where larger groups can eat while sitting on the floor with their shoes off.
Omar was born in 1977 in Jalalabad.
When he was two, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan and his family fled across the border into Pakistan to a city called Peshawar.
Although Peshawar is technically in Pakistan.
It used to be part of Afghanistan.
Right.
The geography is divided by the British.
So even today, a lot of people, there are separatists there.
They claim that Peshawar is. part of Afghanistan, which is all Afghans believe that.
But even in Peshawar, a lot of people believe that Peshawar is Afghanistan.
Interesting.
So culturally, it's really the same country.
Yes.
Okay.
Very similar.
Very similar.
Omar says he wasn't really allowed in the kitchen as a kid, but he loved watching the women in his family cook.
I love the smell of onion when they try to grill them.
I still, when I cook kebabs here, it reminds me the smell of kebabs in Peshawar in Afghanistan.
After graduating college, Omar got a scholarship to go to law school in Texas.
So in July 2001, he left Pakistan and moved to Houston.
At that time, the Afghan community in Texas was small, which was reflected in the food options.
There were not a lot of halal foods back then.
Now Houston is full of halal foods.
And then Afghans, no.
There were no Afghan restaurants.
Do you remember the first western american style food you ate when you got here, or is there a certain, a specific meal that stands out?
That was especially like whoa.
What have i got myself into?
To be completely honest, i love uh, western food.
The only problem we have in even today Is there not halal.
And sometimes I thank God they're not halal because if they were halal, I would be eating every day.
Right.
If McDonald's becomes halal, your cholesterol is going to go through the roof.
Exactly.
And in Danish, for example, any steakhouses in Texas.
When I drive by, it's mouth-watering, but again, it's not religiously halal to eat.
Omar found himself missing the flavors of home.
But he didn't cook and there weren't any Afghan restaurants, so he turned to restaurants that serve food from neighboring countries.
To the west of Afghanistan is Iran, so Omar tried a Persian restaurant.
But Persian food typically doesn't have as much spice as Afghan food, so it didn't hit the spot for him.
He thought he'd try food from Afghanistan's neighbor to the other side Pakistan, where the food tends to be spicier.
Omar did like those flavors, but...
The pita bread did not taste good.
Pita bread is something that I never liked, and even today I don't like it.
We eat clay oven bread.
And what's the difference in taste between those two for you?
A huge difference.
It's like the other one, I'm sorry to say it, it tastes like paper.
You're eating paper.
There is no taste to it.
But our has a taste.
It's cooked.
It's really good.
And maybe it's cultural.
Maybe some people won't even like our bread because they're not used to it.
So I'm nothing against it, but I was not used to it and I'm still not used to it.
Right.
For you, you want your bread.
Yes.
It sounds like that restaurant was like, at that time, that was the closest you could get.
Exactly.
That was the closest to Afghan cuisine, I should say.
Right.
So on one hand, it sounds like it felt good to get something close.
Yes.
But also, it wasn't exactly what you wanted.
Exactly.
There was a gap.
It's not home.
Two months after Omar arrived was 9-11.
A month after that, in October 2001, the US invaded Afghanistan.
Omar watched what was happening there from afar while earning his law degree in the US.
When he graduated in 2005, he never took the bar.
Instead, he got a job as a contractor with the Department of Defense.
The military needed people who spoke the local languages in Afghanistan.
Omar's job was to recruit those linguists in the U.S.
Then they'd go off to Afghanistan to work there on the ground.
He did that for a couple years.
Then a new job opened up.
It was a similar role, recruiting linguists, doing operations.
But this time, he'd be doing it in Afghanistan.
So I thought maybe this is I can help local economy and at the same time, help the US government by recruiting the right people to work for them.
And the job was a very good job, paying very good.
In 2007, Omar flew from the U.S. to Qatar, then on to Bagram, the U.S.
Air Force base in Afghanistan.
You know, I was scared in the beginning, to be completely honest.
I was thinking, I thought something was going to hit the plane when I was in C-5 going from Qatar to Bagram.
And when I landed, everything changed.
I saw people walking.
I saw people with no body armors in the base.
So I felt a lot better when I went in.
But it was not the same like you were in Afghanistan.
It was like just you were in another city in the U.S.
Right.
Yeah.
I mean, I've spent a tiny bit of time on a military base.
It's kind of weird.
Yeah.
You feel like it could be anywhere.
Exactly.
It's sort of like a very kind of generic place.
Exactly.
Eventually, Omar was stationed at Camp Phoenix on the outskirts of Kabul.
Exactly.
Thousands of troops and contractors were stationed there.
Omar says it wasn't an easy place to live.
It felt like a prison because they weren't allowed to leave the base.
Every once in a while, they might go hiking at a nearby mountain range, but that was pretty much it.
So he was technically back in Afghanistan, but it didn't really feel like he was back in Afghanistan.
Omar began recruiting Afghans to work with the military.
Even though he wasn't allowed off the base, local Afghans came to the base looking for jobs.
He would screen them, test their language skills and assign them work.
I fit right in and they connected with me.
Instead of going to any...
White guy, black guy, or Hispanic guy, they prefer me.
They felt comfortable.
And I think that was the reason I was filling that gap.
I was useful, and it felt good.
But of course, it was also hard, dangerous work.
Experts believe that more defense contractors were killed in Afghanistan than American service members.
Omar tells me about a suicide bombing just outside the base that was so close and knocked him to the ground.
One of his other jobs was to inform the families of local Afghans when a relative of theirs had been killed.
He says he struggled to sleep when he knew he had to do that the next day.
And he worried about his own family.
Later, he was able to get visas for them to go to the U.S.
But as long as they were in the region, he never told them where he was stationed.
I kept it a secret.
I did not tell them because they were scared that if I worked there, I may get targeted.
And I kept it secret not only because of their worries.
But because I was worried that if people find out that I'm here, maybe they will hurt my family.
And am I right?
I understand that the Taliban would supposedly target Afghans who supported or worked with the U.S.
Of course.
Even before they targeted the U.S. soldiers.
Oh, yes.
As Omar and I sit and talk, Solomon brings tea to our table.
Thank you.
This tea smells so good.
You just poured it, and the whole table smells like a garden.
Is this sugar?
What is that?
This is sugar, brown sugar.
It's called jaggery.
Okay.
Oh, yes.
I've had this.
Oh, my God.
It's so good.
Yeah, you can put that in tea, and you can bite and sip tea afterwards.
Oh, you dip it in the tea and then bite it?
You don't have to dip it in the tea.
You can just bite on it and sip tea afterwards.
Let me demonstrate for me.
Oh, you hold it in your mouth kind of?
Yeah, you can bite on it.
Right.
And then it goes very well with the tea.
Oh, my God.
I got to try this.
I'm going to take this piece here.
Mm-hmm.
That's delicious.
This is hitting the spot perfectly.
Is it okay if I order?
I didn't eat, so we eat together.
Yes, I would love that.
I need to try Salman's chapli kebab.
You make the chapli kebab, okay?
Yeah, I want Salman's.
Omar starts rattling off instructions and dishes to his son, who looks eager to please, but a little overwhelmed.
You want to write it down, Salman?
Just go ahead, take notes, and take it to the kitchen, okay?
I tell you, you're going to be able to retire very soon.
He's able to cook the chapli kebab because it's like a patty.
In addition to the chapli kebab, Omar orders a few other kebabs and barani banjan, an eggplant dip similar to baba ghanoush, but it's served warm.
He also asks for lamb karai, chunks of lamb marinated in spices and cooked in tomato sauce.
Solomon leaves the table.
But a minute later, he's back.
Salman's back.
Hold on.
How is the food in the military base?
I mean, I'm not complaining.
They had good food.
But if you eat the same food every day...
It's no good anymore because... And it was not just one kind.
I remember Camp Phoenix.
You can't find that kind of dining facility here in the US.
They had...
Over a hundred different kinds of items, cooked, uncooked, even Mongolian night, live barbecues.
Wow.
Yeah, but you know, you eat it every day, you get tired.
After a couple years maybe.
Yes, but local foods were amazing.
How would you, because you weren't supposed to leave the base.
Exactly.
How did you get your hands on local food, Omar?
Probably if my supervisor hear what I did, they will not like it.
We were not allowed, but we would still bribe the locals, literally give them extra money.
I won't call it bribe, but to make them a little extra.
Extra job on the side, yeah.
So they would bring food from outside and $20, $30 will buy food for 10 people.
And everybody in that area would come and share.
And was this home-cooked food?
No, it was from restaurants.
It was from restaurants.
Yes.
And what were some of the dishes that they were bringing back?
Chapli kebab was one of them.
Okay.
Because this is an easy thing.
Ground beef and you mix some spices.
You know, it's very easy, accessible.
And then lamb chops is another famous.
They call it shinwari kebab.
We had the kabali palau, which is lamb cooked inside rice, some vegetables too.
So the American soldiers, what were their reactions?
They said, if we eat this food seven days a week, we will never get tired of it.
Each time we brought it, they would literally have...
I danced before eating.
I remember a lot of military personnel from all races.
I'm talking about black, Hispanics, white.
It was a feast, honestly.
They had other food as well.
Every once in a while, we would tell them, go get us Chinese.
We had Chinese food in Kabul.
It was different.
It was mixed with some Afghan spices.
Really tasty, though.
We would bring that as well because it had that taste of Afghan in there.
We wanted to hear more about these meals, so we tracked down a defense contractor who worked with Omar at Camp Phoenix, named Michael Nunez.
He's from Jamaica, lives in Georgia now.
Michael told us that even 15 years later he remembers It became a ritual.
You know people would get around and wait for it.
We got Palau, I think the name of the rice with carrots and I think lamb, chicken, fish.
Lots of veggies and bread and Afghan pastries.
And I gained so much weight over there.
I can't believe it.
Michael says the food on the base was bland.
And food's important to him.
He loves to cook.
Sometimes he would make Jamaican food.
But whether it was that or the Afghan food.
Having that bonding and, you know, enjoying the food and the culture kind of took your mind off the dangerous aspect or you know what was going on around us.
You know, for a brief moment, you know, you were like enjoying life.
Those meals didn't just make an impression on Michael Nunes.
They also gave Omar an idea.
When I saw people liking Afghan food, that moment I decided if I come back, I'm going to try a restaurant.
Coming up, Omar moves back to Houston and opens his restaurant.
And it quickly becomes much more than a place to eat for Omar and the community.
Stick around.
It's time to open up a can of advertisements.
Welcome back to This Porkful.
I'm Dan Hashman, and I want to throw a couple of deep, very serious ethical questions at you.
Let's say you're eating with your significant other.
It's just the two of you.
Do you need to ask permission to double dip?
If so, is there a point in the relationship at which you no longer have to ask?
And then how about this one?
How guilty should you feel about not eating the leftovers from something your partner cooked?
On last week's show.
We open up the phone lines and take on your fiery hot food disputes and food questions with cookbook authors Ham El-Weili and Pailin Changchinat.
We hear from one couple who've been in a serious dispute over double dipping for some time now.
Rina thinks she shouldn't have to ask her fiancé Cole if she can double dip.
I think it's silly.
We share germs.
We kiss.
Like, he's okay with double dipping.
Why do I have to ask every time?
And Cole, what's your take?
I would summarize my position on this as it's nice to be asked.
So where are you at now?
What is the double dipping status now?
We use it to rile each other up.
If I don't ask, generally Cole will let it slide, but not always.
And then sometimes if I want to poke the bear, I'll make direct eye contact and ask.
Ham and pie weigh in on this issue and many more, including a listener who insists that eating a hot dog from both sides creates a perfect final bite in the middle.
Yeah, we had thoughts on that one, too.
That episode's up now.
Check it out.
One more quick note.
We have a special segment sponsored by Bonnie Plants at the end of this episode.
So make sure you stick around till then to get some really helpful, really great pro tips for your vegetable garden.
Now back to the Afghan Village restaurant in Houston where I'm talking with owner Omar Yousafzai.
After four years in Afghanistan and a couple more in Turkey, Omar moved back to the US in 2013 and continued working as a defense contractor.
It felt good to be back in Houston.
You know, you feel like Houston is my place.
I want to live in Houston.
What was it about Houston?
I think when you land in the US, in any city it can be Kansas, it can be DC, it can be Houston that becomes your birthplace.
Honestly, I feel like I'm in Afghanistan today.
I feel like this is my home.
I lived here all my life, and I won't trade it. for any city in the U.S.
While Houston now felt like home, one key component was still missing.
We didn't have good Afghan food in Houston.
Even my own family, we did not find the taste.
So one day we were driving and I saw a restaurant for lease.
The restaurant was fully equipped.
You have to pay goodwill.
You have to pay a lot of money to get a place like this.
How much cooking had you done in your life at that moment?
Not much, not much.
Omar hadn't forgotten how all those Americans at Camp Phoenix reacted when they tasted Afghan food.
And he wasn't going to let his lack of cooking or restaurant experience stop him.
He signed the lease and spent the next few months trying to get the kitchen up and running.
Then he had to find a chef.
First one he hired before the restaurant even opened never showed up on time.
Omar fired him.
Then he found a guy with decades of experience cooking in restaurants.
But that chef was quickly overwhelmed with the job.
The first day that we did the grand opening, he said, I can't do this job.
Because it's too much for him.
We had a good crowd.
On the day of the grand opening.
Grand opening.
Your chef said, basically, I can't do this.
He said, I'm going to help you.
Right.
But that day he gave me the notice.
Omar convinced him to stay on just long enough to train the next chef, Ghulam Bastani.
And just in case.
I said, you train him, you train me at the same time.
I cannot depend on nobody.
So both Ghulam and Omar started learning.
And because Omar really didn't want to risk losing another chef, he offered Ghulam part ownership of the restaurant.
Once they were on their own, Omar and Ghulam had to fine-tune their cooking skills.
They still didn't have much experience.
Fortunately, Omar was able to get help from another source, his mom.
But she would come at night sometimes, show us how to do stuff.
Do it differently.
We were doing it, but do it a little differently.
Sometimes when we take the food from here to the house, she would comment.
What kinds of comments?
Okay, so the bread, she would say, hey, you know, they need to mix it a little more.
The minute we take the food, she will tell me exactly how it is.
So we can correct it and don't repeat it.
Right.
She will tell me the flowers are not mixed right.
I still feel it.
The salt is extra there.
The spices are less here.
So all these comments really made this place perfect.
So she was like your secret weapon.
Yes.
Right.
Yes.
Are you ready for food?
Sure, sure.
This looks incredible.
Oh my goodness.
Holy smokes.
More food just keeps arriving.
There is a glorious platter of meats and grilled vegetables and rice.
This looks...
Oh, my God, the spices, the aroma just hit me.
It smells amazing.
Let's just run through everything we see before us.
So I see Salman's own chapati kebabs which look similar to burger patties, but probably with a lot more flavor.
Exactly.
A lot more spices.
It is.
I believe this is lamb.
I just asked them.
This is lamb karait. which is basically lamb cooked in tomato sauce, but with Afghan spices.
When you say Afghan spices, what are the major spices?
The major spices is cumin seeds and coriander saffron a lot of saffron for the coloring and black pepper.
Okay.
And so we have the naan, garlic naan, which is just glistening.
It's garlic with some butter on top and cilantro.
And then we have the eggplant dip with yogurt sauce on top of it.
Then we have the kebabs, of course the famous chapli kebab, the chicken kebab marinated in saffron and some herbs.
Then we have beef shami, which is similar to chapli kebab, but in a different shape.
It looks amazing.
Should we start eating?
Yes, please.
Let's dig in.
You go first, please.
I'll leave the microphones recording, but I'm going to put it down for a minute because we can focus on eating.
You know priorities.
Everything was fantastic.
All the meats, just juicy and well-spiced.
The lamb karai was my personal favorite.
The meat just fell apart.
Following Omar's lead, I spooned the tomato sauce on my rice.
That is a bite I won't soon forget.
I sort of think there's like a universal language of comfort food.
Hearty, flavorful food made with care that just feels like a big hug inside and out.
You know, I didn't grow up with Afghan food, so this isn't what my grandma cooked, but it sure tasted like someone's grandma cooked it.
Then there was the bread.
What do you think, better than pita?
A lot better than pita.
I sell pita bread in my store every day.
And I hope and I wish that I will never need to eat it because you never know.
Maybe I stuck in a military base somewhere and they feed me pita bread.
I'll eat it.
But this is a lot better.
This is different.
It's got a crust to it.
Yep.
Flavor and also a crust.
Yep.
Am I right that you also have a practice here that if someone comes in and doesn't have enough money for food,
Always.
Always.
Everybody in this restaurant knows that if somebody comes in, they don't have money.
They don't go hungry.
Always.
No reasons asked.
They can just come and eat.
How often do people come in?
We have people daily coming.
In my community, it's not easy to ask for food.
I'm sure probably with every community, but I know my community, it's the hardest thing to do.
To ask for free food.
Why?
It's just honor.
Even I told the guys here they're trained that if they are hesitant, if they ask for how much is this dish, we already know that he cannot afford it.
So we told the guys not to charge them.
Coming up.
I talk with a few people who've newly arrived from Afghanistan about how they're faring and what it means to have a restaurant like the Afghan Village near them.
That's coming up.
Stick around.
And now, a delicious word from our sponsors.
It's very good.
Welcome back.
All right, let's return to the show.
So Omer has brought that taste of Afghanistan to Houston, the taste of home that he was missing when he arrived.
Since opening his restaurant in 2013, he's added an Afghan grocery and gift shop in the same strip mall.
Afghan village has grown into a community hub with Omer as its unofficial mayor.
There are various nonprofits working to help the Afghans who arrived over the years and they know Omer as someone to come to in an emergency.
He's gotten phone calls in the middle of the night from the local police to help interpret for Afghans who've been arrested.
He's advised on Afghan burial practices for funerals.
But most of his work centers around food, providing that familiar taste to people who feel far from home.
The table on my right. the big table.
They are all newly arrived evacuees with this current crisis, with the Taliban taking over.
The guys who are sitting right over here next to us?
These guys are among the 10000 Afghans who've arrived in Houston since 2021, when American troops withdrew and the Afghan government collapsed.
The US government had promised to evacuate any Afghans who had worked alongside Americans in Afghanistan.
There was even a special immigrant visa program that started back in 2009 to do just that.
But according to an organization called Association of Wartime Allies, as of a couple years ago, there were more than 78000 people eligible for those visas who were still stuck in Afghanistan.
Their lives could be in danger under Taliban rule, especially given their work with Americans.
Recently, their chances of getting to the U.S. got even slimmer.
The Department of Homeland Security paused immigration applications for people in a bunch of countries, including Afghanistan.
Just a few weeks ago, news broke that Afghan refugees who helped US forces and are now stranded in a former military base in Qatar are being pushed to return to Afghanistan or potentially be resettled in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Here in the US, the Trump administration ended temporary protected status for thousands of Afghans, which could leave them vulnerable to deportation.
For now, there are still 200,000 Afghan immigrants who made it to the U.S.
Some of them are people Omer recruited way back when he was at Camp Phoenix.
The big number of the people that I hired there came to Houston on special immigrant visas.
And they know me.
I don't know them because I hired thousands.
And they will tell me exactly when I hired them.
And they are so thankful.
They know that I was able to help them out.
And I'm the reason he came to the U.S. and he's supporting his family.
So I'm so proud of what I did.
I will do it again in a heartbeat.
Are those immigrant visas the ones that were given to Afghans who worked with the U.S. military?
Yes, yes.
I know there's been some issues with some of those visas.
Not everybody who was supposed to get them got them.
It's a big issue because a lot of the qualified people, they were not able to get the visas.
And right now, most of those people are still in line.
They're waiting and they're hoping that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
A lot of the Afghans who do make it to the US seek out Omar and his food.
Because they do different businesses, right?
Some of them are in trucking, truck business.
They would park their truck right in front on the main road on this Hillcroft.
With the emergency lights on.
Right outside this restaurant where we are right now.
Emergency lights on because they found out Omar owns this restaurant.
They would come and say hello and they will introduce themselves and they take off.
Right.
So yes, it's beautiful and they're all over.
Grab one kebab for the road.
Yes, exactly.
Today is no exception.
As Omar said, there are a few people sitting right next to us who arrived recently.
As-salamu alaykum.
I want to ask a few questions, but they don't speak English and I don't speak Pashto.
So Omar translates as I talk with Ziarat Gul Daudze.
He's been in the U.S. for six months.
So far, it's not an easy journey.
It has been tough because we're away from family.
And it has been only six months, so it's going to get better, hopefully.
How old are you?
And is he married?
Does he have kids?
He's 38.
Poor kids.
They're in Afghanistan, and he wished they were here.
Is he trying to get them here?
How does that work?
So far, no, because there is no specific guidelines on how we can do that.
There's no system.
There is no system at this moment, but he's hopeful that it's going to happen.
How's the food?
It's very good.
Has it been hard to find the foods that are familiar to him around Houston and other places besides the restaurant?
He says that it took me 30 minutes in different buses to come to this place, because I can't find this kind of taste nowhere.
And I eat here and then I take some groceries from the next door and then I go.
Ziad Ghul tells us that he was doing logistics for the U.S. military in Afghanistan.
When the government collapsed, he fled to the US and ended up staying on a military base in Wisconsin.
And that's actually when he first heard about Omar and Afghan Village.
He said, when we came to Houston we searched the restaurant and it came on the top and we came here then.
He said I saw the same culture.
I saw the same people spoke the same language, my own food, so I felt like I was in Afghanistan.
So how does it feel, Omar, for you to hear that?
Amazing.
It's emotional.
All right, well, tell them I say welcome and good luck.
Towards the end of our meal, the chef comes out to say hi.
This is Ghulam Bastani, Omar's partner in the business.
He speaks some English, but Omar translates for him.
And everything is fantastic.
The food is very delicious.
Yeah, thank you.
Are you worried that Salman is going to take your job?
Are you worried that Salman is going to take your job?
The next generation has to take over because we're becoming older and the new generation has to step in and take over.
At this point, Omar tells me that Ghulam's son is also here.
Salman brings him over.
His name is Yusuf and he's 12.
He helps out at the restaurant sometimes too.
I'm not really into the waiter stuff.
I'm into the cooking.
You like to be behind the scenes.
Yeah.
I agree with him.
I don't want to be a waiter.
I want to be a cooker.
You guys like to both be behind.
Yeah, I want to be a chef.
What do you like about it?
Like when people taste your food, you love the smile on their faces.
You know, like you just feel something and that's when you know you want to cook.
Salman, this is the best kebab I ever had.
I'm glad that you like it.
Thank you.
Yes, very, very good.
I think pretty soon your dads are going to be out of a job.
They're going to have to just go retire so you kids can take over, huh?
Yeah.
I think you're ready.
You're doing amazing work here, omar.
Thank you.
I would imagine as much good work as you're doing and i'm sure it feels very rewarding.
It's also can a time, on certain days, feel like a certain weight.
Yes, people call on you.
You're getting phone calls.
You told me at four o'clock in the morning.
Sometimes yes, somebody needs something.
You're the guy everyone calls.
Yes, There must be some times that that's hard.
Yes, of course.
Are there days, though, that it ever feels like too much?
Of course, we are human, you know.
There are days, ups and downs, of course.
But overall, overall, I'm satisfied.
I'm very, very happy, thankful.
That's Omer Yousafzai, owner of the Afghan Village Restaurant in Houston.
Since we first spoke, Omer has been very busy.
He opened branches of the Afghan Village in San Antonio, Austin, Dallas, and Oklahoma City.
So if you're in any of those places, definitely check out the Afghan Village.
My thanks to Sobiya Katak, Bashir Safi, and Omar Concepcion for their help with this episode.
Next week on the show we talk to a journalist who traveled thousands of miles in search of the best free restaurant bread in America.
Did she find it?
We'll find out.
That's next week.
While you wait for that one, check out last week's show, where we take your food disputes, such as should you ask for permission from your fiancé to double dip, even when it's just the two of you?
And how guilty should you feel about not eating the leftovers of a dish your partner made?
That episode's up now.
Check it out.
And hey, did you know you can listen to The Sporkful on the SiriusXM app?
Yes, the SiriusXM app has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era, plus live sports coverage.
Does your podcasting app have that?
And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more.
It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app all rolled into one.
And right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the SiriusXM app by going to SiriusXMcom slash Sporkful.
This episode was produced by me, along with managing producer Emma Morgenstern and senior producer Andres O'Hara.
It was edited by Tracy Samuelson.
Our engineer is Jared O'Connell.
Music help from Black Label Music.
The Sporkful is a production of Sirius XM Podcast.
Our executive producer is Camille Stanley.
Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.
And I'm Arielle Robb with Dan, live in Houston Texas, reminding you to eat more, eat better and eat more better.
Thank you to Bonnie Plants for sponsoring this segment.
Spring is here, which means it's time to get into the garden.
That's why I wanted to chat with Dr. Amy Enfield, Senior Horticulturist at Scott's Miracle-Gro.
Before you got into horticulture, you wanted to be a musician.
I did.
Do you sing to your plants?
I have.
Am I right?
Is there research that shows that if you play music and sing to your plants, they grow better?
I've read that.
And I think a lot of it, from at least the singing standpoint, is because you're giving off CO2 and they're taking in CO2.
Got it.
But I think there is research out there that happy moods make plants happy, and sad moods and mad moods can make your plants sad, sad.
Do you think that's true?
Considering I've stressed some plants out over the years, yeah.
I think plants are smarter than we give them credit for.
I think they are too.
There's research out there that plants under stress, under attack, insects diseases.
They give off, like pheromones hormones, different chemical compounds to warn the other plants around them.
So, yeah, I think plants are a lot smarter than I think we even understand.
And so then do the other plants around, like, do they have a response?
Can they build up their defenses?
Yeah, they can.
That's so incredible.
So, Dr Amy, seeing as you spent so much time communing with plants around, I think you're the perfect person to help us out here.
I put another call to listeners.
We asked for gardening questions.
One question that we got from a lot of folks how do you keep out deer rabbits chipmunks, stray cats and any other animal that could mess up your garden?
I know a handful of people who swear by planting a marigold border around their gardens, and I've also heard that if the deer is desperate enough, they will walk right over the marigolds.
All right, so marigolds work pretty well, but they're not perfect.
Is there another option?
Herbs in general emit fragrances that tend to be repelling to animals.
That's why, if you go and look at animal repellents which unfortunately, a lot of them are not labeled for use on edible plants, they're essential oils which come from herbs like basil and rosemary.
All right, we're moving on to tomatoes, Dr. Amy.
We got a lot of questions about tomatoes.
Candid Fabrics writes, how do you prune tomatoes so you get more fruit and fewer vines?
So, The biggest thing is to keep it off the ground, which will help with disease.
Any stalks branches, things that are growing so low that they're touching the ground.
You want to cut those off.
Take those off.
And actually, sometimes the more you prune, the more fruit you end up with in the end.
So what you do is you identify your main stalks.
And then, as it starts to branch, it throws off what are called suckers that form in the little axle where the leaf meets the stem.
You will actually get more fruit, bigger fruit on the main plant if you remove the suckers as they grow.
And you just pinch them off with your fingers?
Just pinch them off with your fingers.
All right.
Susan in Southwick says, what's the best way to stake tomatoes?
I have sturdier cages and it still seems like every year the plants get so heavy that they just pull the cages over.
I don't think I've ever had a tomato not topple my cage at some point in the year.
Pruning will help with the weight load.
Except when all the weight gets at the top, it'll still pull your trellis down.
Pruning and thinning out the plant helps with some of the weight issue.
The other thing is it depends on the type of tomato you're growing.
So there are indeterminate, those just keep forming and growing bigger and bigger and bigger.
So they never, what we call terminate in a flower.
Those are the ones that tend to pull your trellis down.
If they get to the size of the trellis, you can always pinch out the growing points and that'll stop them from getting too big.
The other thing you can look for is a determinate type of tomato.
They reach a certain size and stop growing.
Now that could still be six foot tall.
But you know it's going to reach a height and stop growing.
It'll stop at some point.
There are so many different types of tomatoes.
One of the things that I love about the Bonnie website is this tomato picker.
Tell me about the tomato picker.
So the tomato picker, you can pick from determinate, indeterminate, small, medium, large, gigantic.
So if you've got a small apartment or a small balcony, you can go in and select for the smaller sizes.
The type of fruit, are you looking for a cherry, a slicer, a beefsteak?
It helps you drill down all the tomatoes within the Bonnie portfolio.
And so, even if you don't know much about growing tomatoes, you can just check the right boxes and the body will figure out which tomatoes you need.
Correct.
I love that because that's something I struggle with.
My thanks again to the sponsor of today's segment, Bonnie Plants.
As you heard in this segment and the others we've done with Dr Amy in recent weeks, even experienced gardeners struggle right
Whether it's keeping out pests or how much water, when to water, how best to prune for good results.
So if you're an experienced gardener, you may still need some help.
And if you're just starting out, Bonnie's website is a phenomenal resource.
They can help you pick the right plants for your space.
They'll send the plants to your door and they'll give you tips on how to care for them.
Bonnie Plants believes that growing your own garden should be simple, accessible, and attainable.
And you know, Janie and I have a garden.
When you bring in your crop...
Even if it's just a handful of tomatoes or a couple leaves of basil, it's a great feeling, knowing that you grew it, you're going to put it in your food and you're going to eat it and have that satisfaction.
Bonnie is going to help you do it.
With over a century of experience growing fresh quality plants, Bonnie Plants can be your partner in successfully growing delicious fresh food and finding your moment.
Head to bonnieplants.com for more.
