Mun O Salwa
By Scott Millsop
Mun O Salwa​
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Waqas Khan, the proprietor of Mun O Salwa, said this at least five times while we were visiting: “Everything is from scratch. Fresh. Hand-made.” It’s a matter of pride. It’s also an explanation. We were sampling the menu and one of our group members would say something like “Oh my gosh. This is delicious!” and he would say “Everything is from scratch. Hand-made.” We might have been talking about a bread or a sauce or an entrée. “From scratch.” And then he would call back to the kitchen, “Oh. We need the mango habanero sauce.” You know it was freshly made.
Ethnosh is visiting this restaurant at a particularly interesting time. The location on Colonel Glenn Highway in Fairborn has only been open since December 2025, so as Khan says they are “learning from experience.” That’s lucky for us Noshers.
Photos by Bobby Tewksbury
There is a recurring theme in foodie discussions about whether ethnic food is authentic, or whether it has been changed – we say “dumbed down” - to fit the blander tastes of the general public. We at Ethnosh usually appreciate and praise authenticity, but here we have something else going on. These chefs are on a creative tear, recreating traditional cuisine, experimenting, trying new ideas in order to make food that people really like. They’re not dumbing it down; they’re waking it up.
Another big plus in the Ethnosh experience is that noshers get to sample several different dishes in a single meal. At Mun O Salwa that covers a wide range of flavors and textures. The ethnic root is Pakistan, which is a melting pot to begin with. They will serve us gyros, tika masala, dosa, wraps, paneer and then fried chicken. We smiled at the inclusion of good old American fried chicken but then we tasted it and said “Oh my gosh.” Then Khan said, “Hand made. From scratch.”
There were at least six bottles or containers of sauces for the various dishes. Bean. Peanut. Tomato. Mint. Mango Habanero. And others including something red in a bottle that looked slightly dangerous. It was not. It was delicious. We were advised to put some green sauce on a bit of chicken. It was sound advice. We tried the paneer veggie roll to make sure our vegetarians would be well served. It turns out that everyone will get that wrap and it is food from heaven. At this point it would be good to note that Mun O Salwa translates as “food from heaven”.
There is another Mun O Salwa location on Linden Avenue. They’ve been there for a couple of years. This whole thing got off the ground when they had four items on their menu, cooked in their home kitchen and offered free delivery within five miles. Origin stories are different now. It’s a new world.
Some of our Ethnosh outings visit restaurants that feature handed-down know-how from ancestors in other parts of the world. Waqas Khan is an entrepreneur complete with degrees in business. He was in Pakistan until he was 18. Then to Cypress for education. He visited a brother-in-law in New York who owned a restaurant and it all came together. They’ll have this all figured out as a business in no time at all, but we are fortunate and privileged to be a part of it while they’re still artists.