Dastarkhān

A dastarkhān (Persian: دسترخوان, дастархон, дастархан, дасторкон, दस्तरख़्वान, дастарқан, দস্তরখান, дастурхон, दस्तरखान) or dastarkhwān is the name used across Central Asia, South Asia, the Caribbean, Mauritius and Fiji to refer to the traditional space where food is eaten. The term may refer to the tablecloth which is spread on the ground, floor, or table as a sanitary surface for food, but is used more broadly to refer to the entire meal setting. The Mughal Indian cookbook Dastarkhwan-e-Awadh, which details the Awadhi cuisine of Lucknow, emphasized the importance of the dastarkhwan.

Dastarkhwan is a word of Persian origin meaning "tablecloth". It is used in many other languages of the South and Central Asian region such as Uyghur, Balochi, Bengali, Pashto, Urdu, Sindhi, Hindi, Kyrgyz, Kazakh, Uzbek, Turkmen, Bhojpuri and Nepali.