HYDERABAD: Missing your favourite food? With quality concerns about outside-cooked food amid the Covid-19 pandemic and most eateries still closed, the Do-it-Yourself (DIY) meal kits make it easy to cook signature dishes at home.
With either many Working from Home (WFH) for long hours, or those with less or no kitchen experience surviving on instant noodles, these pre-portioned ingredients, prepped vegetables and meat, and semi-made sauces, offer a range of gourmet fare that can be quickly rustled up at home. With less effort, and in most cases, all one needs is a cooktop and a dish or pan.
“With restaurants closed, and hygiene a major factor, the F&B space has seen a rise in DIY kits from different brands. It enables cooking complicated dishes even at home. These kits come with an easy to follow step-by-step guide and fresh ingredients,” says Bharat Suthapalli, a food blogger.
Want to whip up something different from your usual? These are some ready-to-be-made meal kit options in Hyderabad.
‘Make’ your cake and eat it too
Coming right out of Cake Island, a cloud kitchen is a DIY cake kit. The first thing we ask is, do we need an oven to order this. And the answer is “no.” Deepthi, the owner, tells us, “We do all the hard work – we bake the cake, you make the cake.” The food kit contained a one kg tiered cake with plain white icing on it, colour icing pipes, different garnishing, a ruler, instruction manual and a cake knife. We got the pineapple flavour and had a blast decorating it. The cake was moist and spongy, and it was a fun evening of family time. Started this month, Deepthi says, “As avenues for having fun have come down in the past six months, we came up with this idea to create a means for our customers and their kids to have fun in a safe environment.”
Price is Rs 750 per cake. For order, check their Instagram
Kuch meetha ho jaye
Do you have a sweet tooth and have been left craving for your favourite mithais because they are time-taking and cumbersome to make at home and you are still wary of a trip to your local mithaiwala? Well, motichoor laddu is something I love, and Almond House’s ready-to-prepare ‘Home Sweet Home’ pack filled that yearning for me perfectly. We are not surprised when Chaitanya Muppala, CEO and MD, Almond House tells us that motichoor laddu is , in fact, a hot-seller. The neatly packaged ingredients came with easy-to-follow and detailed instructions that even a kitchen novice can follow. The laddus turned out, both in taste and shape exactly as seen on their retail counters. The great thing is the quantity- each different pack that we tried, made more than enough for a family of four. Chaitanya comments, “We identified a need to create a family activity and desire to make sweets at home. Products such as Walnut Halwa, Kaju Barfi, Til Laddu, Ajmera Kalakand, Milk Mysore Paak, Bobbatalu and Motichoor Laddu are conventionally found to be difficult to make at home, and we endeavoured to create an experience where store-bought quality can be created simply by adding water and heating.”
Price starts at Rs 249. Available at their stores/website
Surprise your family
With neighbourhood cafes and restaurants still closed or offering a limited fare, the popular party starter, spicy chicken wings, has been missing-in-action. So, the delight to make BBQ Wings, followed by a Chicken Handi Biryani at home was too much to pass on. The DIY meal kit from Foozyy Mealkits came with chicken wings, a pre-made sauce and dips. The steps were clear and the sauce was a perfect mix of salty and sour with just a hint of chillies. The biryani was pre-assembled and went straight on the stove. The serving was good for three hungry people. ‘Made-at-home’, it was mildly spiced and cooked through perfectly. It was launched last month by college students Sawan Dasari, Santhosh Reddy, Hema Latha Dasari, Sai Teja, Saharsh and Vivek Vemula. They have an extensive DIY menu of vegetarian and non-vegetarian delicacies. They inform that Barbeque Wings, Butter Chicken, Achari Paneer Tikka, Malai Chicken Curry, Schezwan Chicken and Chilli Babycorn are some of their most ordered dishes. “The best part is you do not have to be a professional to cook our recipes. Anyone can make them in 30 minutes,” says Sawan.
Price starts at Rs 159 for 2-3 servings. Details at www.foozyy.in
Organic meat from the farm
Want to make a whole roast chicken, but don’t know how? Telangana Fresh Meat offers their cook@home box which consists of a whole dressed chicken, two ready marinades and dips. The organic chicken from their farm at Moinabad got cooked succulently and the gravy was finger-licking good. Even though the instructions were detailed, a little knowledge of basic cooking will be useful to make this dish. Started on July 15, Sikander Alam Khan, founder and CEO informs that they also have cook@home boxes for Shaami Kebabs and Burgers.
Price starts at Rs 650. Details on www.telanganafreshmeat.com
Hyderabadi delicacies
“CIY - Cook It Yourself was conceptualised during the lockdown,” says the owner, Anam Mirza. Offering the local Hyderabadi cuisine, these ready to cook meal kits have pre-portioned ingredients and are simple to cook. “We have ensured that we retain both tradition and taste, handed down to us, over generations,” says Anam. The most ordered dishes on their menu are Shaadi Ka Red Chicken, Double Ka Meetha, Bagara Baigan and Hyderabadi Chicken Dum Biryani.
Price starts at Rs 250 Details on their Instagram page
Why D-I-Y?
‘‘We identified a need to create a family activity and desire to make sweets at home. Products such as Walnut Halwa, Kaju Barfi etc are conventionally found to be difficult to make at home, and we tried to create an experience where store-bought quality can be created by adding water and heating,’’ says Chaitanya Muppala, CEO and MD, Almond House.