ISLAMABAD: More than a thousand people gathered in the gardens of Islamabad Serena Hotel to celebrate the Spring Festival 2018 which began in the morning and went on till late afternoon.

Each section of the beautiful lawn showcased live cooking stations and displays of the various cuisines from the hotel’s restaurants and to ensure that children remained entertained Disney cartoon characters, a street magic show and face painting stalls complemented the pleasant weather and copious amounts of food.

The most crowded area was the baradari section with Pakistani food where Chef Saeed Baloch said: “As you enter this part of the lawns, the first stall is a paanwallah who is making plain and exotic, regular and sweet, paans to order. Then there is an assortment of chana chaat, dahi bhallay and special gol gappas.

“If you look just beyond that, there is a live station where one of our chefs is preparing lamb meat takkatak and then Shinwari karahi. The live barbecue has lamb botis, chicken botis and kebabs. We thought our foreign guests especially would like to both see and eat Sajji since that is famous in Pakistan so you can see that as well. Sindhi biryani and fresh naans out of the clay oven complete the entrees. In desserts we have kulfa, falooda and jalebis. We have created a zabardast mahaul (fabulous environment).”

While much of the crowd in the baradari was Pakistani, there were some foreigners as well.

In another corner, Oriental food captured the visitors’ attention.

Chef Wayan Subrata, while preparing a mountain of fried noodles to replace one that was almost finished, said: “This is the Wild Rice cuisine and I’ve mostly selected Indonesian street food because I thought people would enjoy that.

“There is Gado-gado, an Indonesian salad of slightly blanched vegetables and hard-boiled eggs, boiled potato, fried tofu and tempeh, and lontong (rice wrapped in a banana leaf), served with a peanut sauce dressing. You can see the freshly prepared Nasi Goreng, that is fried rice, fried noodles and spicy fried chicken.”

General Manager of the Hotel Michele Galopin said: “The hospitality industry is fundamentally founded on relationships and we pride ourselves on the culture of care that permeates everything we do.

“While we strive to make all our activities and events memorable, the Spring Festival is especially significant because it brings all our friends and their families together to celebrate the beauty of Islamabad in spring.”

Swiss Ambassador to Pakistan Thomas Kolly said: “This is a great event with great people and great food!”

Salma Khan, who had come with her family to the Festival, said: “This has been a fun outing for all of us. My husband and I tried all sorts of things from the stalls – he has a sweet tooth so he spent some time trying the filled doughnuts and baklava at the Rakaposhi counters. I really enjoyed the Karachi burger and lassi. My sons have had their faces painted and had popcorn, cotton candy and chips. What a great way to spend a Saturday!”

Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2018