The chef at work, Photos by Mohammad Ali / White Star

There are menus to be planned, ingredients to be carefully chosen and preparatory work to be done. Kitchen layouts have to be studied for a buffet style arrangement with food stations for catering events where he prepares food in people’s kitchens with extraordinary creativity and passion. Chef Ali Hussain’s day starts at 3am and ends at 8pm. “I’m constantly multitasking and very busy until around eight at night, 24/7.”

The mouth-watering aroma of cake that has risen to perfection or of steak that has tenderised or the starchy odour of fettuccini that has just turned al dente means so much more to him than to any other chef. “Just by smelling I can tell you the food is done, whether it is cooking or baking,” he says.

At 47, Hussain has 18 years of cooking behind him and what makes him particularly inspiring is that he is visually impaired. Born with night blindness, he was able to do everyday things like driving a car before completely losing his sight in the 1980s.

But he doesn’t believe his disability is a restriction on his abilities. “No matter whether you are visually impaired or not, life has challenges for everyone; you have to overcome them. There were times in culinary school when I felt left out. But I ignored that feeling and when I cooked and presented, it went very well and I was encouraged by my colleagues and my trainer chef who told me that I was very dedicated to my profession.”

Visual impairment hasn’t stopped him from fulfilling his dream of becoming a world class chef

Hussain, who lives in New Jersey, was born in Karachi, Pakistan and moved to South Africa (where his mother is from) as a child. He moved to the United States in 1995 at the age of 27 and graduated from Promise Culinary School in 2012.

Last year, Hussain began his own catering business called “Cooking Without Looking” where he does home cooking and private catering for parties. He is working on a book of gourmet recipes called Healthy Meals as well.

Chef Ali Hussain enjoys working with seniors on a state-funded community programme, cooking healthy meals for people with disabilities and special needs. “This includes diabetics and heart patients who have special dietary requirements.”

Before he graduated from culinary school, Hussain interned in Karachi at the Sheraton International Hotel, in an Italian restaurant called La Mamma, under the supervision of a French chef.

It was in the US that he discovered his love for cooking. “A group of friends started to feel hungry and since I was the only one not working at that time, they asked me to cook something for them,” he recalled. “I agreed and they showed me where the spices were and gave me a spoon to measure them out.” He cooked bhuna gosht which they thought was awesome. “It was an amazing experience for me. Before I had even gone to culinary school, my hand was so set that friends from out of town would come to eat my cooking.”

His impairment doesn’t slow him down, Photos by Mohammad Ali / White Star

Presently, Hussain is preparing for his entrance test for the College of Culinary Arts at the Johnson & Wales University, Rhode Island where he plans to specialise in food sciences. He showed me a huge 1,200-page book On Cooking that was probably the equivalent of Gray’s Anatomy for medical students. “This will answer the 105 questions that I am preparing for the test. It is the same book that I used as a culinary student, 12 years ago. We simply have to have this book all the time with us Monday to Friday, without it, we are nothing,” he explained. Hussain uses the Victor Reader Stream to play books on his media player through speech output.

“No matter whether you are visually impaired or not, life has challenges for everyone; you have to overcome them. There were times in culinary school when I felt left out. But I ignored that feeling and when I cooked and presented, it went very well and I was encouraged by my colleagues and my trainer chef who told me that I was very dedicated to my profession.”

Before he opted for his fast-paced, culinary career, he contemplated working with medical transcripts with doctors. “Everyone is either a doctor or a lawyer in my family but when the time came for me to decide what I’m going to pick as a profession, I thought, being a lawyer or a doctor is not what I’m looking for. I decided to make a great big change in my life and opted for cooking, which was something I could do, considering my visual impairment. I knew that this is what I wanted. As I became older, my passion for cooking grew.”

Hussain was trained by Chef Richard Reiss, who is retired now but still works with him. He remembered his days as a student. “I would leave around four in the morning to reach college by 9am. When the classes ended at 4pm, I would leave and reach home by 9pm. I would do this long journey every single day for six months. Despite that I would be so lively and energetic when I entered the kitchen. My pleasure is in helping people and cooking, and I enjoy what I do. I never get short tempered or irritated even if there is a huge workload.

“Every chef has a specialty but Cliffside, where I live, is multicultural so I’m open to all cuisines. I can make a chicken in 12 different ways and each will be amazing. I can do Japanese, Turkish, Malaysian, Italian or American.”

Ali says that currently there is a big demand for Italian food. “People are getting tired of eating sandwiches and burgers and they like to sit down to a meal. Secondly, Italian food is not spicy but flavourful, comforting and fattening too!” He lowered his voice and laughed.

His wife is Italian and became his sous chef. “We both cook our specialties for each other although she prefers my cooking to hers.”

Despite his culinary prowess for creating new recipes and experimenting with a variety of cuisines, he loves cooking a traditional pot of what he calls ‘Pakistani biryani’. “For our mid-term exams, every student had to make a dish from their own country and our chef whose grandfather happens to be from Pakistan asked me to cook biryani. A lot of people helped me do the prep and it came out beautiful. When she had it, she came round and hugged me and said, ‘you killed it’, which in culinary terms means, it’s the best! I could not believe that I had cooked it so well.”

Ali is visiting his family and wants to share healthy food practices with people here. He is especially enthusiastic about healthy cooking and using fresh locally grown vegetables. “I feel that although food is a big deal with people in Pakistan, they don’t know healthy eating, and eat a lot of fried food.”

Hussain enjoys tremendous support of friends and family and is happy to have inspired people. “I don’t want to be famous, nor have my label on cookbooks or pots and pans. I want to travel globally with a mobile kitchen to feed the less fortunate people. Food changes lives.”

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, March 29th, 2015

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