{"id":913,"date":"2026-10-15T21:20:25","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T21:20:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thetripbook.com\/?p=913"},"modified":"2026-10-15T21:20:25","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T21:20:25","slug":"tracing-the-spice-routes-how-chef-zubair-mohajir-found-his-culinary-home-at-muhajir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/?p=913","title":{"rendered":"Tracing the Spice Routes: How Chef Zubair Mohajir Found His Culinary Home at Muh\u0101jir"},"content":{"rendered":"

Few chefs in the Chicago culinary scene have made as prolific and varied a mark over recent years as Zubair Mohajir. Known for driving a wave of inventive restaurant concepts across the city\u2014including Lilac Tiger, Mariela, Mirra, and Sarima\u2014Mohajir has consistently pushed boundaries in how global flavors are presented to diners. Yet, his latest venture, Muh\u0101jir, represents something profoundly different from anything he has tackled before. It is not just another restaurant opening in a bustling metropolitan market; it is an intensely personal exploration of identity, history, and the deep, winding paths of human migration.<\/p>\n

The opening of Muh\u0101jir serves as a focal point for the culinary industry as part of "Now Open," a yearlong series celebrating some of the most exciting new dining establishments of 2026. Throughout the year, food culture publications check in behind the scenes with opening teams across Chicago, New York City, and Washington, D.C., capturing the unfiltered reality of launching a buzzy restaurant. These behind-the-scenes accounts offer a rare glimpse into the logistical hurdles, creative breakthroughs, and candid reflections of the proprietors behind the nation’s most anticipated culinary debuts. For Mohajir, Muh\u0101jir is the culmination of a lifelong journey\u2014one that bridges a career pivot from finance to the kitchen with centuries of ancestral history.<\/p>\n

What did you want to explore with Muh\u0101jir that you hadn\u2019t been able to do yet with your previous restaurants?<\/h2>\n

For Mohajir, the restaurant’s namesake is rooted in his own family tree. In Arabic and Urdu, the word "muh\u0101jir" translates directly to "one who migrates." The term carries specific historical weight, tracing back to the partition of India and Pakistan, when Muslim populations were relocated. Growing up, Mohajir and his family often pondered the origins of their surname. <\/p>\n

The pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place after Mohajir transitioned away from a career in finance to pursue professional cooking. His late maternal grandfather embarked on a dedicated quest to map the exact geographical roots of the family name. The search ultimately pointed back to Southern Basra in Iraq\u2014a revelation that struck Mohajir deeply, given that the region sits squarely at the heart of historical global spice routes.<\/p>\n

This fascination with historical trade corridors is not entirely new to Mohajir\u2019s cooking. For five years at Coach House, he has immersed himself in the ancient culinary traditions of southern Spain and southern Portugal. Those regional cuisines reflect a complex layering of pre-Crusade Muslim, Christian, and Jewish influences, further shaped by Southeast Asian traders navigating the maritime and land routes that stretched through the Mediterranean, North Africa, and the Iberian Peninsula. <\/p>\n

Driven by an enduring obsession with history, Mohajir realized he wanted to do more than simply feed people; he wanted to provide historical context for every plate that left the kitchen. At Muh\u0101jir, that vision comes to life by riding the ancient spice road: a vast network starting in Portugal, winding through the Mediterranean and the Levantine region, pushing out of Basra into the Persian Gulf, and finally making landfall in southern India, where Mohajir’s own story begins. In Mohajir’s view, the overarching theme of the restaurant transcends his personal ancestry to encompass a universal truth: humanity is defined by migration, and every family’s story traces back to somewhere else.<\/p>\n

\"Chicago\u2019s<\/figure>\n

Why did you decide to build the restaurant around live fire?<\/h2>\n

While Mohajir had built an extensive resume working across various kitchen setups, he had never previously anchored a concept around live fire cooking. However, as the vision for Muh\u0101jir crystallized, relying on standard modern kitchen equipment felt fundamentally mismatched with the historical narrative he wanted to convey. <\/p>\n

The decision to cook over wood fire was a deliberate step backward into foundational cooking methods. Mohajir recalls memories from his grandmother\u2019s house in India, where contemporary gas stoves were far from ubiquitous. When conceptualizing a restaurant dedicated to ancient migration and historical spice routes, he recognized that standard saut\u00e9 pans and modern stovetops could not capture the authenticity of the past. To tell the story of the spice road truthfully, the kitchen had to return to the primal, transformative power of wood fire.<\/p>\n

Is there a dish that feels especially representative of Muh\u0101jir?<\/h2>\n

The commitment to historical narrative and live-fire cooking manifests vividly in the restaurant’s signature duck experience. The dish draws direct inspiration from a 927-year-old recipe originating in southern Spain\u2014a culinary artifact reflecting a convergence of Roman garum traditions alongside Muslim and Jewish influences.<\/p>\n

The preparation is an intensive, multi-step process. The kitchen starts with a whole duck, which is expertly butchered, allowing the crown to dry-age for seven days. The wings are repurposed into a rich, deeply concentrated jus, while the legs are transformed into a classic confit. During service, the duck crown is blasted over an open flame before being finished in a brasa oven. Diners seated in the dining room have a direct view of the whole ducks hanging over the open fire.<\/p>\n

When the dish is brought to the table, it is presented on an ornate Turkish platter designed to highlight its complex cross-cultural roots. The presentation includes black raspberry achaar, a saucier of duck jus, a side of duck rice, and crispy duck skin cut into delicate medallions that mimic duck chicharr\u00f3n. The centerpiece is the duck breast itself, boasting an exceptionally crisp skin coated in a spice blend lifted directly from the millenia-old recipe. Featuring a precise combination of cumin, coriander, cardamom, toasted pine nuts, red wine vinegar, and fish sauce, the dish stands as a tangible testament to historical cross-cultural collaboration.<\/p>\n

You have a bar called Bobo behind the restaurant. How do the two spaces complement each other?<\/h2>\n

The hospitality ecosystem created by Mohajir extends beyond the main dining room into Bobo, a distinct bar space tucked away behind the restaurant. The concept for Bobo is deeply intertwined with Mohajir\u2019s partnership with Jacob Dela Cruz, with whom he previously collaborated on Sarima. <\/p>\n

\"Chicago\u2019s<\/figure>\n

It was Dela Cruz who originally suggested the name Muh\u0101jir, offering the profound and simple observation that everyone comes from an immigrant background. When the time came to conceptualize the adjacent bar, the spirit of collaboration continued. Bobo is named in affectionate tribute to Dela Cruz\u2019s father, whose name is Bho, playing on the Tagalog term of endearment where "bobo" translates colloquially to "silly" or "stupid." <\/p>\n

Despite the serious historical and cultural weight driving the food program at Muh\u0101jir, the proprietors wanted to ensure the overall experience retained a sense of playfulness. The physical layout of the venue naturally links the two spaces; guests cannot reach Bobo without walking straight through the main restaurant. This architectural flow creates a symbiotic relationship between the dining room and the bar. Diners arriving early for a reservation frequently stop by Bobo for a pre-dinner drink, while others retreat there to cap off their evening. The layout sparks curiosity in both directions: guests enjoying a drink at Bobo are often enticed to book a table for dinner, while patrons navigating the main restaurant find themselves wondering about the lively energy buzzing just out of sight in the back.<\/p>\n

What has it been like to run Muh\u0101jir so far?<\/h2>\n

Running a high-concept restaurant of this magnitude comes with constant operational hurdles, but Mohajir approaches the daily realities of hospitality management with seasoned resilience. Having navigated the launch of multiple distinct dining concepts across Chicago, he has developed a methodical approach to identifying problems head-on and collaborating with his team and supporters to find solutions. Notably, the business model avoids traditional private equity backing, relying instead on the restaurant’s guests as its core investors, which shapes how the team manages expectations and navigates industry obstacles through repetition and experience.<\/p>\n

For Mohajir, Muh\u0101jir represents a profound personal milestone. While previous ventures involved building concepts where he supported other talented chefs\u2014such as entrusting chef Rishi Kumar to run the kitchen at Mirra\u2014Muh\u0101jir places Mohajir firmly back where he has always yearned to be: hands-on in his own kitchen, telling his own story. After years of hard work and wild industry turbulence, he views the restaurant not merely as another business opening, but as the professional and personal home he has worked toward his entire career\u2014a place where he ultimately plans to stay for the long haul.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Few chefs in the Chicago culinary scene have made as prolific and varied a mark over recent years as Zubair Mohajir. Known for driving a wave of inventive restaurant concepts across the city\u2014including Lilac Tiger, Mariela, Mirra, and Sarima\u2014Mohajir has consistently pushed boundaries in how global flavors are presented to diners. Yet, his latest venture, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":912,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[734],"tags":[1227,834,736,735,294,53,737,1229,690,1226,738,1225,1228],"class_list":["post-913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-food-tourism-culinary-travel","tag-chef","tag-culinary","tag-culinary-tourism","tag-food-travel","tag-found","tag-home","tag-local-food","tag-mohajir","tag-routes","tag-spice","tag-street-food","tag-tracing","tag-zubair"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetripbook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}