Banu Restaurant Iranian

Banu kabob and vodka bar is a delicious journey that begins from the moment you visit its website and continues when you enter the restaurant at their Queen St. West location in Toronto. Here you are transported to 1970s Iran, when the country was abuzz with culture, cosmopolitanism, the pop-art of Andy Warhol and vodka.

Samira Mohyeddin, a seasoned restaurateur, shares banu with her younger brother Amir — chef extraordinaire — and older sister Salome, who manages kad banu, their Iranian café just 10 minutes away. Before entering the restaurant business, Samira was a student of modern Middle Eastern history and Gender Studies at the University of Toronto, while Amir was in chef’s school at George Brown College.

“One day, in 2005, I was cycling past this space, when I saw that it was up for sale. This was my sign that it was time to fulfill my dream of presenting Iranian food and culture to Toronto in a way that had not been done before,” says Samira. The siblings opened banu as an homage, not just to the 70s Iranian culture and nightlife, but also to their beautiful mother, Zarrin. In Farsi, banu means lady or dame of culture, respect and distinction.