Hayat Ali Naji Al-Laith

Hayat Ali Naji Al-Laith is a person of many interests. She holds a masters in business administration and loves to cook, a skill she learned from both of her parents. In 2018, Hayat, her husband and children moved from Sana’a, Yemen, to Istanbul. Adjusting to her new home was difficult — she found it particularly challenging to enter the workforce, and she joined the LIFE Project to learn more about the Turkish business climate.

Hayat is eager to share her culture through its food — she constantly updates and tweaks traditional Yemeni recipes, always striving to make the perfect version of the dish. Although she prefers a home-cooked meal over one from a restaurant, she’s always had a dream of opening and running a restaurant of her own, where she could serve traditional, home-style dishes. She’s working towards that goal by catering, making her versions of asida, shafoot, bint al-sahn, and the other classic recipes that she has shared in these pages.