Last night Naseem Khan, owner of Namji Wolverton and Xscape, scooped the award for the Best Restaurant in Buckinghamshire 2021 at the Asian Food and Restaurant Awards, truly earning the moniker ‘The Queen of Punjabi Cuisine’ in Milton Keynes.
The AFRA’s are the Oscars of the Asian food scene in the UK and the glittering event took place at the Montcalm Luxury Hotel, Marble Arch, London where the crème de la crème of the UK Asian food industry was invited to join in the celebrations.
Naseem said, “I am still pinching myself that Namji has won this award! It is such an honour, and it makes all the hard work that myself, my husband Malik and my team do, worth it all. It is very humbling to receive this recognition. Many people know that the recipes that we use at Namji are old family recipes and were handed down to me by my mother who sadly passed away this time last year. I know that she will be looking down on us proud and smiling. This award is for my Ma!”
Namji’s Wolverton & Xscape were up against literally hundreds of Asian restaurants across Buckinghamshire.
“After the hard year we had in 2020 we just kept on going, no matter what, and of course, we took a huge gamble opening Namji Xscape during a global pandemic too. But we really do have the most amazing customers who are always supportive no matter what we do; whether that’s rallying to help us raise money for causes, donating food and goods to the Afghan refugees, NHS cook-offs, our soup kitchen, feeding the school children; they always come through for us and so we want to thank them from the bottom of our hearts for all their support, always.
We know that we are entering another period of uncertainty but receiving this prestigious award has really put the wind underneath our wings and we are just going to focus and keep rising as a family and as a business. Namji Namji Namji!!!” Concludes Naseem.
