Thursday, March 20, 7:00 P.M.
Members $85, guests $110

Before knighting a young man, the ancient Persian king Khusrau would give him a test. But it wasn't archery, fighting, or riding on which his knighthood depended. King Khusrau would grill the would-be knight on his knowledge of food. Given the high regard in which it was held, it's not surprising that Persian food was "the most subtle and sophisticated in the Middle East," as Saveur's Margo True wrote, nor that throughout the Empire's 3,000-year history, the army lost a lot of battles.

In the last century, Persia became Iran, underwent an Islamic revolution, and fought a war with Iraq. But luckily for us, certain Persian traditions have prevailed, among them some of the most exacting and delicious cooking around. It's enough to make Iranians exclaim, Bha! Bha! (that's "Yum! Yum!" to the American retirees now feasting on Persian food in the unlikely locale of Naples, Florida).

In 1997, that Farsi exclamation became the talk of the town on golf courses and beaches all over southwest Florida. This was the year that Iranian-born-and-and-bred Michael Mir opened Bha! Bha! A Persian Bistro, "a tiny jewel of a restaurant," according to L. G. Gordon's four-star review in the Naples Daily News. "The cuisine in this place takes your taste-buds for a magic-carpet ride," Chelle Koster Walton wrote in Naples Illustrated. "Flavors tickle, titillate, then burst in a medley of unaccustomed-to seasonings and combinations." Three years after his initial review, Gordon returned, again awarding Bha! Bha! four stars, and this time calling it a "charming oasis" that "has taken both globe-trotters and armchair travelers on exotic culinary journeys."

Mir, your tour guide on these epicurean adventures, moved to the United States in 1973 to study architecture. While in school, he worked in a number of kitchens in the D.C. area. After graduation, he traded the drawing table for the kitchen table, and he moved to Baltimore to establish his first business. Set in a tiny, out-of-the-way space, the Orchard Market and Cafe did a lackluster business in deli meats and gourmet groceries, but when Mir added dishes based on his mother's recipes, the venture took off. Baltimore Sun food critic Janice Baker tried Mir's Iranian fare and declared it "glorious." Before long, the Orchard became a local legend. Mir sold it in 1997 when he moved to Naples in search of sun. His new restaurant has brought Bha! Bha! to many happy Floridians.