Book Your Private InterNASHional Cooking Class Today

The Tennessee Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) is excited to bring one of Nashville's most talented chefs to your next virtual gathering.

We ar e currently booking Persian Cooking Classes with Chef Louisa Shafia in celebration of , the Spring New Year.

The exclusive one hour session includes:

A live cooking class with Chef Louisa where participants learn how to make a traditional Persian dish Recipe and ingredient list sent ahead of time Spotify playlist Zoom calendar invitation and technology troubleshooting A brief look into Tennessee's immigrant and refugee community led by TIRRC (optional)

Up to 100 participants can be accommodated. $1,500 fee per private class

Choose one of the following dishes to learn how to prepare

Ghormeh sabzi sabzi Ash-e reshteh: slow-cooked of lamb, , kidney dried limes omelet with ground and rose petals with fava beans and festive soup of beans, , and herbs topped with fried & mint

Currently scheduling Nowruz classes for April Contact Leah Hashinger to book your InterNASHional Cooking class with Chef Louisa [email protected] About TIRRC

The Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) is a statewide nonprofit organization. We are a coalition of immigrants, refugees, and allies working to lift up fundamental American freedoms and human rights and build a strong, welcoming, and inclusive Tennessee. We believe that real and lasting change must be led by those directly affected by injustice, and for this reason community organizing and leadership development are the core strategies we use to realize our vision. We bring together diverse immigrant communities throughout the state to examine root causes, find common interests, and organize for better conditions. We strive to lift up the voices of directly affected people and invest in leaders at the grassroots level, and to ensure our theory of change is reflected in the way we make decisions, in the work we undertake today, and in the course we set for the future.

About Chef Louisa Shafia

Louisa Shafia is the author of The New Persian Kitchen, winner of Food52’s Piglet award. She has spoken about Persian at Harvard, Google, and New York’s 92nd Street Y, and her recipes have been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, Bon Appétit, and on National Public Radio. In addition to her extensive writing on , Louisa also writes about the diversity of American food, including Nashville’s remarkable immigrant food corridor of Nolensville Pike. Louisa cooks Persian guest chef dinners at restaurants around the country, including Maydan in Washington, DC, Zahav in Philadelphia, and Kismet in LA. Feast by Louisa is her online store where she sells Persian culinary goods. Both her aprons and fabric rice bonnets––damkoni in Farsi––for cooking Iranian rice, are sewn by graduates of the nonprofit Sew For Hope, which provides training to refugee women in professional sewing business skills.

About Nowruz

Nowruz is the Persian New Year, also celebrated by indigenous groups such as Kurds. It falls on March 21, the spring equinox, and it’s all about renewal and the reawakening of nature. Traditional Nowruz feature green herbs, fresh and cooked, in all kinds of preparations, from an herb omelet to herbed rice and soup. Some New Year customs include cleaning the house, getting rid of clutter, and settling old disagreements. A beautiful decoration for the holiday is the sofreh, a table laid out with coins, sweets, seven foods that begin with the letter “s,” and other symbolic items meant to bring good things in the new year.