When Yash Parashar switched on his phone after a long flight to Australia, he received a notification from his mother, Usha Shrotiya. She had sent a photo of a few dry fruit bars. Tears rolled down his face as a few days back he had jokingly told his mother that he can’t take laddoos made by her to his workplace.
“I would rely on cereal bars for my hunger pangs. Mummy would insist that I carry laddoos to work instead of these bars. It was not possible as it is inconvenient to carry the fragile sweets in bags,” he adds.
Usha took it as a challenge and had been trying her best to turn these laddoos into laddu bars. “We were not confident that she would be able to make bars out of it. My wife and I would jokingly throw those bars at each other to check its stiffness. Instead of taking it personally, she remained passionate and took it as a challenge. I was impressed to see her dedication,” shares Yash.
And why not? This was the first time in 62 years that Usha got an opportunity to prove herself.
It took her at least 80 failed attempts before coming to the perfect composition and structure to turn these laddoos into bars. Today, her quest led them to start ‘Mama Nourish’, a food startup that is striving to save traditional and time-tested recipes made by our grandmothers by giving them a modern twist.
A step towards unfulfilled aspirations
Hailing from a small village in Sambhal district of Uttar Pradesh, young Usha aspired to become a daroga (policewoman). “I had filled in the form for the post. My father supported my decision but my mother was protective about me. She opposed my decision saying it was not a suitable job for a young girl. Instead, she stressed on marrying me off,” recalls Usha.
“After my marriage, I was expected to meet all household needs and look after my husband and children. Often, I would come up with some business ideas but I never received any support from my in-laws as well,” she adds with a sigh.
Decades later, Usha got wings to her dreams at an age when most people retire. At 62, she embarked on a journey to build Mama Nourish.
The story of Mama Nourish began with a personal need. In 2021, when Usha became a grandmother, she visited her son and daughter-in-law Apurva’s home in Mumbai. She carried gond ke laddoo (sweets made from edible gum and dry fruits) along with her.
“When I gave birth to Yash, my mother-in-law made the same laddoos for me. I wanted to share this love with Apurva in her postpartum journey. She relished them. Two months later, I went to my daughter’s home in Aligarh as she had also recently given birth. But before leaving Mumbai, I made sure Apurva was well-stocked,” says the 64-year-old.
Usha says her daughter was diagnosed with gestational diabetes.“This meant that I could not give her laddoos. But I am a mother, I couldn’t stop myself from making them for her. As I could not give her jaggery or sugar, I thought of using dates instead. So, I soaked dates, ground and roasted them to make laddoos. Everyone loved it,” she adds.
Meanwhile, Apurva found there were a few laddoos left in her jar. “Apurva would video call mom to ask about the ingredients and procedure to make those laddoos. She tried her best but couldn’t make them. We understood that it was not our cup of tea,” says Yash.
“While mom could send us more laddoos, we realised that in this fast-paced work life, the legacy of traditional recipes made by grandmothers may disappear. We shared our concern with mom and she was quick to come up with a solution,” he adds.
This led Usha to embark on a journey to create snack bars that retained the essence of the original recipe while being easy to transport and consume on the go.
Leaving a legacy behind
In order to understand how pertinent the issue was, Yash surveyed 250 working professionals in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Pune, and Bengaluru along with his college friend, Kunal Goel.
The survey, Yash says, revealed a strong sentiment among working professionals for the goodness of grandmother’s food and the fear of losing this legacy in the fast paced urban life. for future generations. This insight fueled their determination to commercialise their products and bring ‘grandma’s recipes’ back into the limelight.
Motivated by this, Usha continued to perfect her laddu bars. “Firstly, I tried to make them in a barfi (rectangular) shape. Yash took them to his office and all his colleagues loved it. It boosted my confidence also. We thought of tapping into this demand,” she adds.
In January 2024, Mama Nourish was born, offering a wide range of laddu bars made using millets, fenugreek, dry fruits, ginger, and Kamarkas seeds.
The food startup received its first corporate order from Netflix and since then, there has been no looking back. As of now, they are catering to at least 150 major corporate establishments including Google, Meta (Facebook), Netflix, IKEA, and Axis Bank.
Kunal, the chief operating officer at the startup, says, “As we wanted to reach out to working professionals, we tried to find out where they pick up snacks frequently. We found that the majority of them rely on office pantry or vending machines to save time. This gave us an idea to tap into the vending channel. We also installed our vending machines at airports in Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi, and Ahmedabad.”
So far, the startup has sold one lakh units of the laddu bars through these channels. “Within a few months of the launch of our company, we have received an overwhelming response. It is too early to comment on revenue but we have observed a boost of 10 times growth since we started. We have received a lot of enquiries from Australia, California, and Germany as well,” shares Yash.
Yash shares that it was a difficult choice for him to quit his job at TATA Motors to launch their food startup. “While Kunal was working with robots and I was making cars, we found our true calling at my home in my mother. We call her an enterprising mother. I remember, she always encouraged me to participate in any competition or projects. She never dissuaded me from following my dreams – something she lacked as an ambitious child,” he adds.
Meanwhile, for Usha, the journey to starting her own food business has been phenomenal. “Now that my children are settled, I have all the time to myself. Earlier, I wanted to establish an identity for myself but now I have got the opportunity to fulfil my dreams. It is so satisfying to get compliments from my relatives and friends. Sometimes, people ask me why I need to work at this age now. But there is no age limit to achieving your dreams. I feel so confident now,” she adds.
Edited by Padmashree Pande. All photos: Mama Nourish.
