A MEAL WITH STRANGERS: How supper clubs are quietly reshaping Dhaka’s elite dining culture

Growing up reading Plato, I often imagined what a Greek symposium must have looked like – Athenian dinner parties filled with music, philosophy, and debate around the table. I also knew well enough that I would never have been invited, as I am neither an aristocrat nor, more importantly, a man.

So when my friend Nafisa A Iqbal shared her experience of attending a women-only supper club in Dhaka, it caught my attention.

"Mercy Apu handpicked eight women for the supper club, and the location was kept secret. There were artists, journalists, women from the corporate world – everyone was incredibly ambitious and accomplished in their own field. We bonded over the meal. I am still connected to all the women I met that day."

Nafisa was talking about Table for Her, a women-only supper club founded by Adhara Mercy Tripura. 

While supper clubs have long existed in cities like London, New York and Seoul, they are still a relatively new phenomenon in Dhaka. The format is different from a regular restaurant – guests register in advance, hosts curate the guest list, and the location is usually kept undisclosed until the booking is confirmed. 

Even the people sharing the table may not know one another beforehand; they generally learn who they will be dining with only when they arrive at the venue. Each dinner begins with a place card bearing the guest's name, a small detail that reflects how deliberately the experience is put together. 

These intimate gatherings offer spaces where strangers meet, exchange stories about life and everything beyond it, and share more than just food. The meal becomes a way of connecting with people, ideas and experiences that might otherwise never cross paths.

And making that table only for women changes the dynamics of the gathering even more.

What inspired Mercy to create a dining space exclusively for women? The answer lay in Virginia Woolf's writing, as well as in something women have craved for generations – the need for a space of their own. For Mercy, the idea came from something she herself had always longed for.

"Women hardly get time just for themselves. Even when we go out to eat, there's almost always a male presence around us," Mercy said. "I wanted to create a space where women could spend hours together, share a meal, and talk to other women they had never met before. I love cooking, so I thought, why not cook for women?"

Mercy started Table for Her four months ago. Every gathering begins with a registration process, after which she goes through each application herself, carefully curating the guest list. 

Photo: Courtesy

She also designs a new menu for every supper club, sourcing ingredients from Dhaka's local markets as well as indigenous producers and communities whenever the menu calls for it. From Korean, Thai and Vietnamese cuisines to, most personally, a Chattogram Hill Tracts (CHT)-themed dinner that paid tribute to her own roots, every gathering is built around a different culinary story.

Nafisa attended the CHT-themed night. She remembers tasting vegetables she had never tried before, alongside familiar flavours reimagined with subtle fusion. 

The meal began with individually plated appetisers before moving into a family-style main course. At first, everyone was shy. After all, dining privately with strangers is still a new experience for most people. But by the time the main course was served, conversations had shifted to ambitions, family, spirituality and politics. Over the food, they had bonded. And the cherry on top was what they learned about indigenous cuisine.

"Before serving each dish, they explained its history, its significance and why it mattered," Nafisa said. "It was my first time trying indigenous cuisine, where the ingredients were sourced from and the food was made by indigenous communities themselves."

Mercy knows that Bengali taste buds can differ from those of the Hill Tracts. Rather than serving every guest the same dish, she adjusts recipes according to individual preferences and dietary restrictions – spicier for those who want heat, milder for those who don't.

Checking dietary restrictions and curating each plate to the guest is what makes a supper club different from a restaurant. Talking to Anisha Binta Kamal and Mariam Hossain Nupur, the struggle and the passion behind hosting became even clearer.

"Women hardly get time just for themselves. Even when we go out to eat, there's almost always a male presence around us. I wanted to create a space where women could spend hours together, share a meal, and talk to other women they had never met before." Adhara Mercy Tripura, Founder, Table for Her 

"If the ingredients aren't good, the food won't taste good, no matter how you cook," they said.

For Anisha and Nupur, who started The Supper Pair last June, quality begins long before anyone sits down to eat. After registration, they carefully check each participant's social media profile to avoid any unwanted situations.

The same attention to detail carries into the food. Every plate is a small balancing act: sweetness against spice, texture against richness, and even the colours on the plate against the theme of the night. They know which vegetables are fresh in which market and plan their shopping accordingly.

Even when the cost runs higher, they refuse to compromise on taste. Take their "Mehfil and Meals" supper, for example. They wanted to serve burrata with Gala apples, as they felt the particular apple would provide the right crunch alongside the carrot. When they could not find it in local shops, they ordered it specially rather than replace it with something else.

That level of attention is also what makes the supper club model work for them. There is no fixed menu to maintain and no pressure to commit to one particular cuisine. Each gathering gives them the freedom to start with an idea, find the right ingredients and build an entire meal around it. As Anisha and Nupur put it, "It comes from wanting to experiment with food, to explore every kind of cuisine we could think of. If we opened a restaurant, we'd be confined to one type of cuisine forever. A small, changing set-up lets us host on our own terms." 

Talking to Mercy, and to Anisha and Nupur, left me fascinated by the kinds of cuisines Dhaka's supper clubs were bringing to the table. It made me wonder: beyond global cuisines and fusion menus, was anyone experimenting with Bengali food?

At supper clubs, every plate is a delicate balancing act, with each colour thoughtfully chosen to reflect the theme of the night.PQ:

There were a few names. Open Plate Studio's reimagining of medieval Bengali food came to mind, alongside a handful of chefs experimenting with local ingredients in new ways. But my search eventually led me to Shanchayita.

Although primarily known for its private dining experiences, it also hosts supper clubs whenever a new seasonal menu is introduced. Whether as a takeaway, private dinner or a supper club, every Shanchayita menu is rooted in vegan Bengali cuisine, reimagining familiar dishes through a philosophy of plant-based, seasonal eating.

Faiza Ahmed's journey with Shanchayita began in 2013, and it was built around a simple idea: veganism rooted entirely in Bengali heritage rather than borrowed from the West.

As she points out, plant-based eating was never foreign to Bengali households. Waking up to two kinds of shaak bhaji with ruti, or khuder bhorta, was simply what breakfast looked like for generations, long before "vegan" needed a name. Shanchayita's philosophy grew from that same soil: plant-based food grounded in local, ancestral traditions rather than imported ideas of conscious eating.

Shanchayita's approach to explore vegan Bengali food with fusion touches is visible in the dishes it develops. Its vegan jorda, for instance, is made with rice and coconut oil, with saffron and toasted cashews. Another example is Rasun Rasayana, a pickle made from single-clove garlic, prepared through sun-resting, oil-curing and layering with spices. These are not simply substitutions for meat or dairy, but attempts to rethink familiar Bengali ingredients through a different food philosophy.

Behind every dinner was a philosophy – about sourcing, seasonality, community and care. Each host, though, approaches it differently. For Nupur and Anisha, the supper club remains part-time alongside their regular jobs. For Faiza, it is an extension of her existing private dining business. And for many, it is some combination of both – a way to grow a food business one dinner at a time. 

At a time when fast food and ultra-processed meals increasingly dominate our diets, these gatherings ask us to think about food differently. Not simply as a product to consume, but as something that shapes our bodies. Where it came from, who grew it, how it was cooked, and even why it was served in a particular season – all of it matters.

Of course, all that care comes at a price. Faiza's vegan dinners at Shanchayita cost between Tk1,200 and Tk3,500. While other supper clubs generally charge between Tk3,000 and Tk8,000, depending on the menu and the experience. This puts most of these gatherings within the reach of the upper-middle and upper classes. It is perhaps no coincidence that many are held in neighbourhoods such as Gulshan, Banani and Uttara, though the venues themselves are not fixed. Hosts usually rent a venue for a certain period and change locations if they want to create a different atmosphere.

Social media is central to how these supper clubs operate. Registrations are mostly handled through Facebook and Instagram. A single event can attract anywhere from around 200 to more than 2,000 registrations. Yet hosts deliberately keep the actual gatherings small, usually limiting them to six to twelve guests. The result is a dining culture built around carefully selected company, limited seats and intimate settings.

Photo: Courtesy

Though still an elite dining culture, Dhaka's supper clubs are at least not closed to women. Culture is changeable and adaptable, and what we are seeing as supper clubs today has some similarities with the kind of intimate, paid dining gatherings that once existed in Bengal's zamindar houses, particularly as they were declining. 

Whether supper clubs will eventually evolve and take different forms, become less exclusive across class, and make room for a wider exchange between people is something only time will tell. For now, the city's supper clubs remain an exciting new way of gathering for those who can afford a seat at the table.