Anna Ansari on the Silk Roads and the origins of everyday foods

Silk Roads, Saffron Rice, and the Stories Our Food Carries

Did you know every apple in the world can be traced back to Kazakhstan? In this episode, Samuel Goldsmith sits down with Anna Ansari — Iranian American cook, former trade lawyer, and author of Silk Roads: A Flavor Odyssey with Recipes from Baku to Beijing — to explore how food has connected cultures across Central Asia for centuries.

Anna shares how a plate of Uyghur food in 1990s Beijing tasted unexpectedly like home, why Uzbek plov is far more than the sum of its five humble ingredients, and how cooking Iranian stews became a way to root her blended British-American-Iranian family in tradition. Along the way, they talk nasi goreng technique, the myth of culinary authenticity, and why a Tootsie Roll is her ultimate guilty pleasure.

In this episode:

How the ancient Silk Roads shaped the food we eat today

The surprising Central Asian origins of apples, melons, and rice

Why authenticity in food is more fluid than we think

Anna's death-row dish: tahchin (Iranian saffron rice cake)

Cooking as connection — to heritage, family, and home

Quick-fire confessions: gnocchi disasters, pulled pork parties, and bumpy cake

About the guest:

Anna Ansari is the author of Silk Roads: A Flavor Odyssey with Recipes from Baku to Beijing. A former customs and trade lawyer with a background in Chinese studies, she writes about the intersections of food, history, and identity.

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