Hamed Allahyari

Hi Hamed. I really loved seeing Café Sunshine yesterday. You and Jen have done a great job in the fitout and the food all looked really good.

Thank you.

I read that you had a restaurant in Iran. Can you tell me about how long you’ve been a chef and what you were doing before you came to Australia?

I came to Australia in 2012. Before I came to Australia I was in Tehran; the capital city of Iran. I had a traditional Iranian restaurant and then because of religion…I was born Muslim because my parents were Muslim. Iran is a Muslim country and you cannot change your religion and you have to die Muslim. You have no freedom to choose your religion. But when I was 19 years old, I became atheist. In my country, you are not allowed to do that and if the government fonds out, you are going to be in jail or maybe they hang you. You don’t know what might happen if the government finds out. So I couldn’t tell anyone but finally someone reported me and the government found out and I left my country and left everything behind and came to Australia. I didn’t have time to go to an embassy or get a Visa. I had to find the quickest way to leave and the quickest way in 2012 for me to leave my country was to come to Australia because people were leaving by boat.

I found someone who could help me. I paid him in Iran and he showed me the way through Indonesia and then to Australia. I went to Jakarta and in Jakarta I found a guy who said he would take me to Australia. The way he was talking about coming to Australia, it sounded easy, but on the day we were to go, the boat looked like a fishing boat for a maximum of 80 people and we were 118 people. It was nighttime, about 3am, it was so scary, but I decided to get on the boat because I would have rather died on the ocean than die with my government. I said that to myself to make myself calm.

We were on the ocean for 38 hours and we arrived on Christmas Island. We were lucky because the ocean was flat, not wavy. Because we came by boat, the government put us in the detention centre. Everyone is different but I waited there for five months. After that the government gave me a bridging visa and I came to Melbourne in 2013.

I didn’t have work right or study right on my visa. I had that visa for the first two years and it was very difficult but after two years, I received my work right. My background was cooking and in my country I had my own restaurant, so I thought I would go and find a job somewhere in the city. When I got my work right, I made my own CV and I went to different restaurants talking to managers and owners, whoever was available to talk to me and I said, this is my CV, my background, I know all Iranian food and some Middle Eastern food and I have lots of experience. The problem in those days, or one of my problems was my level of English language. When I came to Australia, all I could say in English was "hello, how are you?" Some of the restaurants said they couldn’t take me because I didn’t have references or qualifications, so I couldn’t find a job. Only one person out of 50 or 60 places called me back to say he had a job for me Friday and Saturday night, but it was washing dishes for $8 an hour and I said, I could not work for him.

I was lucky to get that phone call because after that, I just gave up on the idea of going to a restaurant and I started volunteering so that I could have a reference. I knew there was a centre for asylum seekers in Footscray, the ASRC. I was a volunteer there in the kitchen. Every day they feed 200 people, so on Wednesdays and Fridays I was cooking for 200 people and I was cooking Iranian food. People would come to me and ask me about the food. I found out that not many Australians have tried Persian or Iranian food. Then one of my friends from the volunteering told me about a job opportunity for paid work at Free to Feed, a social enterprise in Northcote. They give jobs to asylum seekers to run cooking classes. In 2016, I started giving classes through to December 2018. I did 208 cooking classes. In these classes, there were at least 10 people, so I had over 2000 people from Melbourne coming to my classes.

So now a lot more people know about Persian food.

Yes, a lot more people have tried it now. When they first came I would ask them whether they had tried Persian food before, maybe five per cent had. I had taught them 8 or 9 different things and at the end of each lesson, I asked them what their favourite dish was. And from doing that, I know what the favourite Persian dish in Melbourne is and I found out that our tastes in Iran are very different to Australia. In Iran, lamb kebab is the most popular food, but here, lamb kebab was number 15 on my list and there were 14 other dishes more popular than it on my list. Number one was an eggplant dish and everyone loved it. That process was very helpful for me to make the menu for the restaurant. The dishes I have put on our menu are the favourite dishes of Melburnians.

That’s pretty good research you’ve done, so you know you are going to please people at SalamaTea.

I finished the cooking classes and I started catering because people in my classes asked me if I did that. First I said no to them, but then I decided to do it, so I got myself some equipment and at the end of 2018 I did my social enterprise catering business and I employed only asylum seekers who had problems finding their first job here because they don’t have qualifications or references, but they are good at cooking. At the start I had three people and then I had five people, all who had the same problem I had when I came to Australia.

I also started working at ASRC as a kitchen manager and I met lots of people who had the skills but couldn’t find a job. I have a list of 20 people who are looking for a job in a restaurant. I have employed 9 of them in the café and hopefully in the future I can do something to help more.

It’s amazing that you have been able to use your own experience to help other people. 

It wasn’t nice going around all of those restaurants and having people say no. It is easy to give up and then stay home and do nothing and then after a year start having mental health problems, depression. I know many people from my culture, asylum seekers, don’t have any family here and don’t speak any English and they are taking medication for depression. If you have a job, you make money, you can buy your things, you meet people and become part of a community. I think now a job is the most important thing to have.

I completely agree. Then at some point you got talking to Jen at ASRC and came up with the idea of opening your own place.

Jen was volunteering in my kitchen at ASRC and one day we were talking and found out we had the same idea about providing work for asylum seekers, then she found the Pick my Project government fund, we won the fund to open the café; Café Sunshine by day and SalamaTea by night.

Jen said SalamaTea means something like cheers in English?

Yes, Salamati means cheers in my language and health. At the end it is usually ‘ti’ but I changed it to ‘tea’ because in Iran, we have lots of different herbal teas. We have saffron tea and sour cherry in the café.

And you make that yourself?

Yes, I make all my tea myself.

How do you make saffron tea?

I get Persian saffron because it is good quality. I grind saffron mixed with cardamom pods, add honey and then I add boiling water and after five minutes you have tea.

Ok, so there are no tea leaves in it?

No, it’s just saffron, cardamom, honey. Saffron is an anti-depressant. In our country, we call it giggle tea, because it makes you laugh.

I like that. What about the sour cherry?

It’s not the season now, so I use frozen sour cherries. They are fresh, but frozen. I boil them and then mash them to get all the flavour and colour out then I strain that through a cheese cloth. After that I leave the liquid on the stove to reduce to a syrup. Then I mix 50 ml of syrup with 120 ml hot water to make the tea. In summer you can use the same recipe, but instead of 120ml water, you can use 70ml water and fill it up with ice and that is a cold sour cherry drink; Sharbat.

It sounds great. You’re making your own almond and soy milk too?

Yes. Almond is very popular. Every day I make 2 litres of almond milk for the café. I soak the almonds and put it in the food processor. You have to know how much water to put in and how much to process. Then after that, I use the almond pulp for baking. I dry it out so it becomes almond meal and bake Persian Love cake, Banana cake, some cookies. 

What’s in your Persian Bliss Balls?

Those were made up. I came up with that idea in Melbourne. I used to see protein balls or bliss balls in shops and cafes and we don’t have that in Iran, we have Ghotab, but that is more sugary than protein. So one year ago I had an idea for Persian bliss balls; I put in dates, walnuts, tahini, spices. Those date balls are very popular.

They would be and they look so pretty. That big plate in the café stacked up with all the different colours.

Inside, they are all the same ingredients, but outside, one is pistachio, so green colour, one is almond, so cream colour, one is rolled in Persian barberries and so is a red colour and rose petals make a purple colour and sesame seeds, so five different colours.

Beautiful. I was watching your little video on Instagram where you walk into the café and talk about the traditional Persian breakfast. Can you tell me a little bit more about that. I saw you had three omelettes as well and one is a sweet one.

Yes, one is a traditional omelette. We make it with tomato, it is like a street food you can have everywhere in Tehran. I’m born in Urmia, a city in the north west of Iran and has a mixture of Azerbajanis and Kurdish people. Khorma is the Kurdish name for date with eggs, it’s a sweet omelette, and I put butter as well and cinnamon to finish. You have that in the morning time to make you strong to finish the day with enough energy, because khorma is healthy and good for your body. It’s not overly sweet; it has lots of good things for our bodies.

There is another omelette with feta. We don’t have that in any cafes in Iran; it’s from my grandma. It is a home omelette; feta cheese and eggs with fresh herbs and it always reminds me of my grandmother. She made it for me and all my cousins. That omelette is very popular in the café. 

We also have a Persian breakfast. I didn’t have a name for it, so I just said it was Persian breakfast because it is one of our common breakfasts in Iran. Noon o Panir o Sabzi, which means bread, cheese, walnut, tea. So we have a Persian feta cheese with walnut mix and next to that is jam and butter, next to that is tahini mixed with grape molasses and next to that is halva. All of this comes in one plate and it comes with black tea because it is kind of a sweet breakfast so you need something to wash it down with. 

Great. And the evening meal you said is made up of the Persian favourites you’ve discovered Melburnians like, so eggplant…what else will be on the menu?

Another dish called Fesunjun, which is a chicken stew cooked with pomegranate molasses and walnut paste and Iranian spice and I have another option on my menu for that made with tofu and carrots for vegans. I have Iranian salad and some side dishes and dips; my Dademi Dips which means my father’s dips. My father made up a dip and I had it in my cooking classes and it was very popular. 

What’s in that dip?

The base is labne mixed with herbs (mint, dill, basil), red onion, spices and chilli. It has seven spices as well.

Thank you, Hamed. You have shared a lot of your story with me and I really appreciate that.

Café Sunshine and SalamaTea

21 Dickson Street, Sunshine