KARACHI: When former Saudi Airlines flight attendant Asiya Rizvi opened a restaurant in Karachi’s upscale Defense neighborhood earlier this year, she brought not only her mother’s Mughlai recipes but also a trove of dishes she discovered during 15 years of flying with colleagues from around the world.
The result is Café 1947, an eatery that blends food with history and is co-owned by two neurodivergent children: Rizvi’s 12-year-old son, Shabbar Ali, who has Down syndrome, and her relative’s son, Raza Shah, who is autistic.
Rizvi, who worked as cabin crew from 1999 to 2014 and flew with colleagues from 51 nationalities, said she often exchanged food and stories with women from different cultures.
“We used to stay with each other for a week or a couple of days,” she told Arab News. “We used to talk about food, what to cook, what to eat. We used to try each other’s food.”
Those exchanges inspired her to design a rotating seven-day menu: Afghan cuisine on Mondays, Chinese on Tuesdays, Pakistani on Wednesdays, Mughlai on Thursdays, Palestinian on Fridays and Middle Eastern and fusion dishes on weekends.
