What began as a passion project from their Noida home has now evolved into a brand supplying homes, restaurants and royal kitchens with prime quality cured and preserved meats and charcuterie.
Meaning the Bawa siblings, Meherwan and Mehma, are definitely bringing home the bacon, with their company Artisan Meats.
Meherwan has been cooking professionally from the age of 17, starring with the Oberoi group in India, before heading to shores as distant as Italy and Canada, honing his skills and learning from the Michelin masters in the old world to the avant-garde culinarians of the new.
When he returned to Delhi five years ago, the original plan was to start his own restaurant. “I learned a lot about slow cooking in Italy and Australia and worked with some of its biggest proponents, and that’s a style I wanted to continue in India,” he recalls, adding, “Though India has a long history of slow cooking, over time and space, especially in the cities, we lost touch with that kind of cooking as well as with our roots in the countryside and from the people who grow and rear our food.”
However, after returning home, Meherwan found a dearth in quality meats as well as suppliers.
“So what started as a stop gap measure for me to stockpile my own cured and preserved meats has since evolved into a full-scale business of preparing meats for others, whether it’s customers at home or chef-driven restaurants. I still consult on other restaurant projects, but Artisan Meats takes up the majority of my time.”
Meherwan’s partner in prime (meats), his sister, Mehma, was also a driving force for the brand. “I have always been into cooking while Mehma has always had a head for business and a commerce background. She wanted to start a food business, and so we got together to start the company,” explains Meherwan, adding that the team now comprises 15 members involved in various aspects of the brand.
While their e-commerce platform currently offers delivery primarily to Delhi-NCR, Artisan Meats has also delivered everywhere from Pune to Patna, with Rajasthan being another big market.
“We have a lot of the royal families as customers, including those who have converted their properties into boutique hotels. They might have tasted our products at friends’ homes in Delhi, and so now they order regularly for themselves as well as their resorts.” And that leads very nicely to another key point.
“Our products are not cheap, but the demand among Indians for quality meat products is only growing and people are willing to pay for premium ingredients. Similarly, restaurants where ingredient suppliers are picked by purchase managers looking at the bottom line may not pick up our products, but the restaurants which are chef-owned or where the chef is a stakeholder and has a say, buy and appreciate what we can provide. Of course, we need to keep our prices competitive for this category, but that’s a volume business anyway, ” concludes Meherwan.