While restaurants are slowly coming back to life in Delhi-NCR, many people, especially those with older family members, are not exactly ready to step out around for a night out on the town.
It’s here where home chefs are coming into vogue, with more and more people ready to eat food prepared in others’ homes and delivered safely and directly to them.
A case in point: Karishma Thapar and homekitchens.in.
Started by Thapar in June, homekitchens.in is a discovery platform for home chefs cooking the food you like. “I got the idea while talking to friends who were looking for safe, tasty home-cooked food, as well as some who had started being home chefs,” says the 28-year-old, who thought of a way for the twain to meet.
Starting with an initial collective of five home chefs, that number has grown to 30, with a steady increase in the ranks as more and more home chefs, both old hands and the newly minted, reach out to her.
Thapar and her core team of three, are supported by a fleet of delivery partners, apart from the chefs themselves. “We standardise the packaging and help chefs with their brand identity, if they so require, as well as streamline their menus and portioning.
We have our dedicated delivery boys, which helps control safety and hygiene standards, and brings down costs,” says Thapar, who points out that while getting a meal delivered from Gurugram to Noida would cost up to Rs 700 depending on the weight, her company fixes the price by a sliding scale depending on the order amount, meaning the “maximum you’ll have to pay would be Rs 300.” As for how she picks the chefs to work with, Thapar prefers to approach them as a client to check out the food.
“Tastes are very subjective. People will eventually find the permutations for their palates and then know what to order. So, I don’t give that as much importance as much as I do to the hygiene, the quality and freshness of ingredients, and the cooking techniques,” she elaborates.
“As of now, I am concentrating on Delhi-NCR because I want to make sure we have the best chefs onboard and our delivery systems and customer service is made irreproachable. I would like to move on to other cities, before moving on to other towns and cities,” says Thapar, concluding, most vitally, “And yes, we are figuring out an app.”