HYDERABAD: Can you pick a particular moment in your life which proclaims your outrageous love for Hyderabad? Pose this question to anybody who has stepped out of the city and the answer, more or less mysteriously sounds unanimous. The exact moment when you start missing your homeland arrives when you unwittingly order for biryani at a place which has no roots to mana city. As soon as the first bite of the dish touches your taste buds, you are left aghast, red-faced and a feeling of disgust fills you up. “Isko biryani bolte re tum? Hamare shehar mein kaise banate maalum? Leke jao re isko. Thoo!!!...” fumes every Hyderabadi who wishes he never left the city in the first place. Such is the love for the city shared by many of its denizens. And why not? Where else can you savour mouth-watering dishes like biryani, haleem, paya, qubani ka meetha, double ka meetha, Irani Chai and Osmania ‘biskutaan’ and relish the slang like haon, nakko, baigan, howla and other such amusing expletives?
Prasad and Goutham, all of 24, are two Hyderabadis who share this sentiment. When they stepped out from the Pearl City to Chennai to pursue B Tech from SRM University, they realised their affinity to Hyderabadi delicacies. “On October 3 2010, Goutham’s brother Gopkiran also joined us and three of us decided to start our unique food joint which blends seamlessly with the signature style of Hyderabadi food. That’s how Nawab’s Dine was first coined in Chennai. We extended our USP to the food lovers in Mumbai on April 12, 2012. In the same year, we set up our restaurant in Kompally Hyderabad on December 22. We started a takeaway counter in SRM University a couple of years ago,” Prasad, co-founder- cum-managing director narrates elaborately.
The three musketeers saved their pocket money for more than six months and also borrowed money from a few well-wishers and friends. “We kept people at home in the dark. We collected capital investment and started the Chennai restaurant. It was a huge success and within a year, with our own savings we went to Mumbai to expand our services. After venturing into the Hyderabad market, we told our parents that we are into restaurant business. Initially they were cynical of our grand plans, but soon they were happy as they saw the results,” they share with sheepish smiles.
These three engineers-turned-hoteliers take pride in announcing that their coveted client list includes some big names in the corporate world like Flipkart, Max, Landmark group, CMR College, Mallareddy College, Baxter, Instakart. “We had started our catering service last year. From daily lunches to product launches, meetings, conference, and other corporate events, we look after every catering service. We deliver nearly 2,700 pax per day to our corporate clientele while we aim to attain an astounding figure of 10,000 pax per day by the end of this year,” he beams with a ray of hope in his voice. More restaurants and catering units in cities across India is in the pipeline too.
It is not new to hear that language has been a hassle to every newbie in the land of Tamil Nadu. These young entrepreneurs too faced those hurdles but overcame it in no time. “We learned Tamil in a short span. As we are new to restaurant business, we faced a few problems in customer service, management, hiring staff, etc,” he adds.
Prasad, Gopi and Goutham earned brownie points from their classmates and friends because they managed both college and restaurant operations with ease and elegance.
“We always feel that life is all about facing new challenges each growing day. We always took every situation every problem in a positive way and never gave up, that is how we started loving what we are doing and now it became our profession,” he beams with a sense of pride in his voice.
Gopi works as the assistant director, while Prasad and Goutham looks after restaurants and catering services. “Goutham and I were born on same day and same year i.e 27-07-92. On our birthday, we invite nearly 500 orphans from all over Hyderabad and offer lunch and few gifts,” Prasad says with excitement in his voice.
“For the past three years, every Saturday, we have been sponsoring food to ‘Sisters of charity,’ an orphanage in Gandimaisamma,” he adds with humility. The seek inspiration from none other than Bawarchi. “We would miss its Biryani badly when in Chennai. Whenever we visited the city, we would pack biryani for the hostel. It was on one of those days in the college that we wanted to make homseick Hyderabadis happy by serving the authentic food of the Nizam city. We never intended to make money out of this business, but eventually, it became our full-time profession,” he laughs.