Bhen Iranian-born cookbook author Atoosa Sepehr first met Hannah Khalil, the playwright who would bring her life to the London stage, the two women found much in common. But there was one thing in particular that connected them: “We spent most of our time talking about food,” says Khalil. The pair are connected via video call as their play My English Persian Kitchen – inspired by Sepehr’s journey from Iran to the UK and the cooking at home that helped her put down new roots – enters its first week of rehearsals.

In fact, they first met on a Zoom call in 2021. David Luff of the Soho Theatre had read Sepehr’s story in the Guardian about how she fled abroad in 2007 to escape her bad marriage. With her husband unwilling to allow her to divorce and her being unable to obtain one herself, she left the country almost overnight, with just an hour to spare before he would block the documents that would have allowed her to leave the country.

When she arrived in Britain, alone in a north London flat and homesick, she called the women in her family in Iran and began meticulously recreating the recipes she had grown up with. She devoted four years to perfecting the dishes of ancient Persia. It gave her purpose and community, as her neighbours were captivated by the smells from her small kitchen. Then her bestselling cookbook, From a Persian Kitchen, appeared after Sepehr gave up her job in the import-export business that had funded her move to turn her recipes into something permanent. Luff knew this story of crossing borders and using food as an anchor of home was a global story that would lend itself to the stage. “It’s a story of hope,” says Sepehr, 47. “Like a rebirth, a new beginning, and not letting the past control you.”

Because she associated cooking with domesticity – exactly what society expected of her – she had previously ignored this creative attraction: “All my life I tried to suppress a part of myself. I never acknowledged it because I wanted to be recognized in my society as an equal to a man. The last thing I wanted was to stand in the kitchen and cook.”

When she was forced to start her life abroad again at the age of 30, that changed: “When I came to this country, everything happened so quickly. I was worried. I knew my husband would not divorce me, so it would be a long time before I could return home. Cooking was the only thing that gave me comfort, the feeling of participating in life again. It calmed me down and gave me focus.”

She travelled all over London after work to source ingredients and got up early to cook, sometimes preparing recipes 20 times to get them right. All of this is material that informs the new one-woman show, which premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival last month. Inspired by Sepehr’s life rather than an exact retelling of it, it places Iranian-Italian actress Isabella Nefar (Salomé at the National Theatre and soon to be seen in the film adaptation of Azar Nafisi’s bestselling memoir Reading Lolita in Tehran)) as a woman in her kitchen, while the story itself travels through places and times.

It explores how food connects Sepehr to both worlds. She continues: “I came home and all I did was cook and sit alone and enjoy the food. I started texting the neighbours and asking: ‘I’m cooking this, should I bring you something?’ That was the beginning of my connection with the people of England – food.” It also brought her closer to her homeland: “As soon as you start cooking, it takes you back. It starts with the smell, then the food, with the memory of the gatherings around it. Food has no language, you can take it anywhere. It doesn’t need to be interpreted.”

Tantalisingly, these evocative smells are captured on stage through live cooking that marinates the theatre with the distinctive flavours of Persian noodle soup – ash–t resteh – prepared according to Sepehr’s recipe, throughout the entire 70-minute show. The idea of ​​incorporating food was there from the start, says Khalil: “I saw a show at the National Theatre called Vincent in Brixton years ago. During the show, they had a real oven on stage and were cooking a chicken. You could smell the chicken!” For this show, the question was: what dish? “I didn’t know Iranian food at all. I cooked my way through Atoosa’s amazing book, we agreed on the dish of the show and Atoosa and I cooked together via Zoom.” (Those first meetings took place during Covid.)

Khalil continues: “Food is a bridge back to her family in Iran and one that brings her to the UK as well. It has created a community for her here. Theatre is also about creating a community, a unique group of people who will experience something together.”

Sepehr met other playwrights before immediately hitting it off with Khalil. Khalil felt her own heritage and upbringing – her father is Palestinian, she herself grew up in Dubai and moved back to the UK with her mother after her parents divorced – underpinned her understanding of Sepehr’s story. “When I started talking to Atoosa, I realised the story is not about Iran,” she says. “It’s about how you start over as a woman, how you build again from nothing. That’s my mother’s story. My father didn’t really talk to me about politics or Palestine. My main connection to my heritage is food, he cooked and taught me these dishes.”

Khalil is clear about the key element of the story: “The strength of Atoosa as a person,” she says. “I wanted to retain as much of her voice and her beautiful turns of phrase as possible. I want people to go home full of joy and hope. What would be great: If someone watches the show and thinks there’s someone on my block that I don’t know, then maybe I’ll go and say hi or cook for them.”

My English Persian Kitchen is a story about heritage, and bringing something passed down from home to a new country and new media is a feat Sepehr describes as “surreal.” “It’s a unique and strange feeling,” she says of seeing a version of herself on stage.

Sepehr now lives in Belfast, where she works as a nutritional therapist, inspired by her own experience with food. “When I was writing the book, and in the days when I was struggling through it, I never imagined that I would end up in a place where my story would be on stage,” she says.

“We can always give up and let the universe or others make a plan. Or you can do something about it and make a change yourself. Food is its own language that transcends boundaries. I really hope that people watch this piece and that it gives them hope and that they know that even in the darkest moments of our lives, nothing is forever and we must always look beyond it.”

My English-Persian kitchen is in Soho Theatre, 16 September until 5 October.