The Little Sauce Supper Club: A fresh take on Iraqi gastronomy by Suzie Bakos

“I’ve always been into food, as you probably know, as a fellow Arab,” laughs British-Iraqi creative force Suzie Bakos.

“Our world is centred around food. You know how it is,” Suzie adds, referring to growing up in a Middle Eastern household where meals were never just about sustenance.

“We never really eat just for fuel. We eat every meal like it's a moment,” Suzie explains. “A lot of the time, your mum will spend days preparing for a gathering. There’s so much care, so much love in Iraqi cooking, and I grew up around that. I had a natural affinity for it.”

It’s this affinity that, Suzie notes, led her to launch The Little Sauce supper club.

Having spent many years as a fashion writer, Suzie first introduced The Little Sauce in 2018 as a blog featuring food reviews and travel stories. However, it wasn’t long before the project evolved into a food event series with a dedicated focus on Iraqi cuisine.

As for the name, The Little Sauce is both playful and personal to Suzie. “It’s a play on the word ‘source’ — a source of knowledge,” she explains. “And because I’m quite small, well, you could say 'I’m a little bit of a sauce.'”

In saying this, Suzie notes that while the name plays on her own persona, the real mission is to share the unique and often overlooked cuisine of Iraq with the Western world.

“I don’t want people to lump Iraqi food under the blanket of ‘Middle Eastern,’” Suzie says. “Iraqi food is so different from Lebanese, for example. Yes, there are some crossovers, but we have dishes that are unique to Iraq, like Kubba Haleb and Kahi with Geymar (Iraqi clotted cream). The way we make our food is different, and that’s what I want people to understand.”

Supper clubs with a purpose  

To date, Suzie, through The Little Sauce, has organised a wide range of events — from fundraisers for Palestine and Yemen to cookery classes with Moroccan women living with disabilities or mental health conditions, as well as partnerships with homeless charities.

Most recently, in March, Suzie’s work took her to Doña, an independent Mezcal and music bar in Stoke Newington, where she held a month-long residency. During this time, she hosted a series of events that reflected her commitment to creating accessible and meaningful experiences centred around Iraqi food.

One of the standout evenings was the Mum and Yum event, which Suzie explains:

“It was a supper club for mums and expectant mums to come together and network in a relaxed setting. I don’t want mums to feel isolated. Why should men's lives continue as normal after having children, but women’s don’t?”

As Suzie puts it, motherhood shouldn’t mean losing the parts of yourself that existed before.

“As mums, we take on so much more,” she continues. “But I believe that if you want to hold on to who you were before having a baby, you should. It should be celebrated. I think we’re living in an era now where women and mothers are truly celebrated.”

As her residency concluded, Suzie’s next The Little Sauce special in April was an Easter Feast, in collaboration with Nazli Ramadan, known as 'Well Fed Naz,' founder and chef of Jurkish, a fusion of Jamaican and Turkish cuisines.

The event, held at Jumbi, a small rum bar and restaurant in Peckham, featured a blend of Jurkish’s Jamaican and Turkish dishes alongside Suzie’s Iraqi-inspired creations, introducing her flavours to a wider audience and promoting cross-cultural exchange.

Suzie explains the connection between the cuisines: "The Turkish have Dolma and similar dishes, and while Jamaican food is different, there’s overlap in the meats and ingredients," which is why, as she notes, “when Naz and I started experimenting with the flavours from all three cultures, it just clicked.”

One dish that perfectly embodies this fusion is Baba Jurk, a blend of Baba ghanoush and jerk seasoning that they created.

In saying this, Suzie highlights the personal connection she felt in bringing together different cultures for the Easter Feast.

“I love Jamaican food — my husband’s half Jamaican, so it felt like a natural connection,” Suzie shares.

Not an Edgware Road experience  

As with any culinary endeavour, Suzie’s modern take on traditional Iraqi dishes hasn’t been without its share of criticism.

While some purists have questioned her approach, particularly her fusion of flavours, Suzie brushes off the critiques. "You will always get someone who has to say something," she laughs. "No matter what, people will have opinions. If it bothers you that much, you’re probably not our audience. We’re here to have fun with food and experiment with flavours."

For Suzie, food should always be about enjoyment. “What’s wrong with Kubba Haleb filled with bully beef?" she asks, smiling. “It works, it’s delicious, and it’s fun. It’s not that deep. If you think it’s that deep, it’s probably not for you — and that’s fine.”

She’s also quick to define what her supper clubs are not. “There’s a time and place for everything," she says. “You’ve got Green Lanes, Edgware Road — those places for a more traditional experience. But you’re not coming to my supper club for that. That’s not what we’re doing.”

She adds, “At my supper club, we serve Iraqi dishes, but in a modern, elevated way. It’s about trying something new, and if that’s not what you’re looking for, that’s okay too.”

Recipes by Suzie

If you'd like to try some of Suzie's signature dishes, here are a few recipes to try at home:

Bully beef Kubba Haleb from The Little Sauce x Jurkish Easter Feast

Makes roughly 40 Kubba pieces

Ingredients

For the shell:

• 4 cups basmati rice
• 1.5 tsp turmeric (optional, as this creates the yellow colour but isn’t necessary)
• 2 tsp salt
• Water

For the filling:

• 1kg corned beef
• 2 white onions, finely chopped
• 6 garlic cloves, crushed
• 2 red peppers, finely chopped
• 3 whole pimento
• 2 tsp baharat
• Sunflower oil for frying

Method:

• Wash your rice, then leave it in water to soak for 20 minutes. Discard the water.
• Cook the rice with hot water as you normally would, but add a little more water than usual, as we want the rice to be very soft. Add salt and turmeric and stir it in. Cover with a lid and leave it to simmer until it’s fully cooked.
• Now, start on your filling. Add a little oil to a pan and fry the chopped onions and bell peppers until softened. Add the beef and break it down with a spoon.
• Add the garlic, pimento, and spices. Let them cook through for two minutes, then remove from the heat and allow the mixture to cool, removing the pimento.
• Once the rice is done, take it off the heat. Once it’s cooled down, put it through a mincer twice at the finest level.
• Knead the rice with a touch of water, then it’s time to shape the Kubba.
• Keep a small bowl of water to the side to stop the dough from sticking to your hands.
• Take a golf ball-sized piece of dough and flatten it in your palm to form a disc shape. Add 1.5 tsp of the filling in the middle and begin shaping the dough around the filling until it forms the shape of an American football. Be sure to close all the edges so the oil doesn’t penetrate inside.
• Heat sunflower oil in a pot until very hot. Add a few Kubbas at a time, making sure not to overload the pot. When they first go in, leave them for a minute to allow them to seal. If you touch them too early, the dough will stick to your spoon, and the filling will spill out into the oil.
• Once golden, let the Kubba rest on kitchen towels and serve with your favourite sauce — anything goes: jerk, barbecue, or ketchup!

Saffron Chicken

For two

Ingredients

• 4 chicken thighs, bone-in and skin-on
• 8 potatoes
• 500ml chicken stock
• Pinch of saffron
• 1 tbsp rose water
• 8 cardamom pods
• Juice of 1 lemon
• A handful of lamb’s lettuce or cress
• Extra virgin olive oil
• 30g green olives
• Rice for serving
• Sea salt

Get Ahead:

• Mix the saffron and rose water the day before, or even a couple of hours before if you can. This helps draw out the yellow colour of the saffron more. Cover and leave it in the fridge.

Method:

• Put a large pot on high heat and add a good glug of olive oil. Season the chicken skin and put it skin-side down on the hot oil until golden brown and crispy.
• Peel and cut the potatoes into rough chunks. Add them to the pan with the chicken stock until it covers the potatoes and chicken halfway, being careful not to get the chicken skin wet.
• Add the cardamom, bring to a simmer, and let it cook for 30 minutes with the lid off.
• Add the lemon juice and check if the potatoes have softened. Taste the sauce and add salt if needed. Once the potatoes are soft, add the steeped saffron and rose water. Let it come to another simmer before serving.
• Serve the dish in a bowl and scatter the olives around it. Toss your green leaves in a little olive oil and serve them on top of the chicken, alongside your rice.

To purchase Suzie’s The Little Sauce Too Hot Hot Sauce, visit the Delli website, an online platform that connects independent food and drink makers with customers, and to tune in to Suzie's parenting podcast, The Plus One Podcast, co-hosted with DJ Izzy Bossy, check out YouTube, Instagram, and Spotify

Zainab Mehdi is The New Arab's Associate Editor and researcher specialising in governance, development, and conflict in the Middle East and North Africa region

Follow her on X: @zaiamehdi