Razavi had been a regular customer at the market ever since he moved to Berkeley in 1976 from his hometown, Yazd, Iran, to attend San Jose State University. At that time, Middle East Market was the only place where Persian and Iranian immigrants could find familiar products from home, including teas, spices, sweets and rice, and it became a cultural and culinary hub for the Iranian community.
The marinade for this grilled chicken recipe, like every recipe in the book, is personal to Nosrat. "If I don't have a deep relationship with it, and I haven't made it countless times over the course of years and years and years," she says, "it wasn't going in the book." It's essentially a descendant of her beloved buttermilk-brined roast chicken -and a tribute to the Persian kebab restaurants she grew up visiting in Southern California. Saffron, onion, lemon juice, tomato paste, black pepper, and yogurt work together to tenderize the meat and create the signature balance of acidity, sweetness, and umami that defines so many Persian chicken kebab recipes.