Chomp chakli in China

Who says that if you relocate to Finland, Spain or Switzerland, you need to forget the taste of India? Now NRIs can log on to oyechotu.com and get their favourite farsan and other food items picked up from popular eateries across the country, and delivered to their doorsteps. What’s more, the services of the website can be accessed by people from multiple Indian cities.

This service, which was started three months ago, has already found favour among Indians living abroad.“I worked in the telecom industry for 10 years and
travelled the world. It was during these journeys that I encountered Indians living abroad. Most of them complained that there was a scarcity of good desi food in their respective countries. So I thought I could help them out with this,” says Ruchita Desai, founder of Oyechotu.com.

The online portal offers food items across various categories like ready-to-eat, sweets, pickles, syrups, chutneys and their specialty, unique foods. “This category is basically devoted to popular specialties from cities across India, like the Baroda chivda or Bombay sandwich masala,” says Desai.

NRIs can log on to the website, check out the items available, place their orders and pay using one of the many currency options available. However, the minimum order has to be at least five kgs.

The items are then sent from Mumbai with a shipping charge that is dependant on weight. If a particular item isn’t listed on the site, you can write in and they will pick it up from any eatery around India and send it to you.

While Desai does say that the most popular items include chivdas and vada pav chutney masala, which isn’t unusual, she did find it odd that these products were popular in China. Desai says, “We’ve had 20 kg orders and even had blogs and discussion forums in Shanghai and Beijing discussing our website. We were also surprised by the response from countries like Netherlands, Finland, France, Spain and Germany.”

Pista House in Hyderabad ships Biryani to Bangalore, Hyderabad, Delhi, Chennai and Mumbai on a daily basis and Coimbatore and Vishkapatanam on a weekly basis. Their dum ki chicken biryani (1 kg) costs R520, you can also order dum ki mutton biryani for the same price.

Anaarkali Butter Chicken offers home delivery of their version of butter chicken, which is based on a mildly spiced butter and tomato gravy, blended with exotic condiments, dry fruits and herbs that compliment the tender grilled boneless chicken.

A dish made from their secret recipe will cost you R6,000.