Pakistan’s Martha Stewart — But More Famous
Saba Imtiaz writes: ‘Zubaida Aapa—the Urdu honorific for elder sister—is a homemaker, turned TV star, turned domestic goddess, and the closest thing Pakistan has to Martha Stewart, but with Stewart’s fame dialed up to 11. Since the nineties, when she made her television debut on a cooking show called Dalda Ka Dastarkhwan, loosely translated as “Dalda’s spread,†named for its cooking oil company sponsor, Tariq has taught generations of homemakers how to raise their children, clean their homes, and make parathas. She has authored at least six cookbooks, doled out countless home remedies (totkas in Urdu) for kitchen, home, and child, and left satire in the wake of her outsize celebrity.’
