Food is an important link to our national identity, cultural heritage, beliefs, traditions, rituals and every-day life.

Curry culture in the UK was pioneered by the Bangladeshis, who first began to settle in Britain during the nineteenth century.

Like many second and third generation South Asians, my identity is as a Muslim first and, in my case, a proud Scotsman second.

Nothing is more telling of the times in which we live than our relationship to food. People will always need to eat but the mechanics of how this most basic necessity is serviced nowadays plays a significant role in hurtling humanity to the edge of the abyss.

A striking aspect of the cultural elevation of the celebrity chef has been the use of inflated (and some would say hyperbolic and pretentious) superlatives to describe them, their techniques, and their output.

We’re told, as a billion people remain hungry and human numbers continue to rise and the biosphere collapses around our ears (mass extinction, global warming) that we must curb population growth by whatever it takes, and that those who are left must curb their appetites.

A poem by Mimi Khalvati.

Since August 2016, some 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled to Bangladesh and thousands more have sought refuge in neighbouring South East Asian nations.