Indian gala night to be held at Queen’s Hotel in Portsmouth for charity

People from across the city will join together to celebrate Indian and Pakistani cuisine while raising money for an important cause.

The Queen’s Hotel will host an evening in celebration of The Road From Karachi – a family cookbook that originated in the 1980s and was founded and published 30 years later.

The event will be held on Friday, February 23.

Nadia Arab’s family set up a cookery school in Buckland in 1984 and in 1987, created the Indian Cookery Made Easy cookbook which was available to students and in WH Smith.

Nadia’s mother, Khalida misplaced her copy and the book was lost for decades until Nadia happened to discover that a work colleague still had an original copy.

She then Nadia worked with her mother to take the classic recipes and recreate the cookbook, which is now available in bookstores including Waterstones and Amazon.

The gala event at The Queen’s Hotel will see dozens of people come together to enjoy recipes from the book, prepared by the Queen’s Hotel chefs, and share inspiring stories, while ticket sales will fund clean water pumps that will be installed in deprived areas in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India.

Nadia is hoping that the event will raise enough money to fund 10 water pumps, which cost £150 each.

One Nation, the charity that installs the water pumps, will be there on the night explaining the impact that these have on communities.

Nadia said: ‘The majority of the sales from the book go towards funding these water pumps. It was really important to me to do this – to make a difference with this book beyond its history. It has a really interesting past history to it but the change it’s making in the future will hopefully be the legacy that it leaves.’

Also speaking on the evening will be Bianca Brathwaite, who will talk about eating mindfully, Stephen Morgan MP, as well as several businesses who have incorporated The Road From Karachi’s recipes on their menus.

But the star of the evening will be Linda [surname], who is an original student of Nadia’s family’s cookery school and who Nadia recently connected with

On the night guests will enjoy a silent auction, live music and dancing, henna tattoos and more and Nadia says she wants it to feel like a big celebration of food and culture.

Nadia said: ‘The event will be a great chance for people who haven’t yet tried our recipes to do so, and to experience a celebration of Indian and Pakistani cuisine and culture. The best part is that if they enjoy any of the recipes, they’ll be able to go home and create it themselves.

‘I’ve been shown so much support from people around the city, particularly local businesses, so I’m really excited and grateful that this event is possible and am hoping to see lots of people supporting and enjoying themselves on the night.’

Tickets can be purchased on Eventbrite.