05/26/2024
From selling small batch Indian spices out of a New York apartment, to a multi-generational top-rated Indian restaurant, Café Spice has always been about bringing authentic Indian flavors to your table. Now, their ready-made dishes mean you don’t have to sacrifice flavor when you crave convenience. Swipe through to learn their story from Co-founder & CEO, Sameer Malhotra.
Slide 1: From left, Hari Nayak (Culinary Director), Sushil Malhotra (Founder), Sameer Malhotra (Co-founder & CEO)
“My dad, Sushil, was an engineer by training. He came to the U.S. to go to school but always wanted to be an entrepreneur. His father had a contact to get some spices from India so they would bring them in, package them and sell them on the weekends. So that was the first step.”
Slides 2 and 3: “This is my mother, Lata, and father in 1977 at the opening of my father’s first restaurant, Akbar, in New York. It was one of the first fine dining Indian restaurants to open in New York. Early articles about my dad talk about him as a pioneer of Indian restaurants. Akbar opening was a big move that brought the family into the food business.”
Slide 4: “This is myself and Virgilio, our Chief Operating Officer, at the groundbreaking of our new manufacturing facility. My greatest success is seeing the Café Spice brand in every major city around the U.S. Anytime I go into a supermarket and see our product there, it shows me what we have been able to achieve. It’s still the same restaurant recipes but now we supply these grab-and-go meals around every major city.”
Slide 5: Freshly prepared Cauliflower and Potato Curry.