Meet a 79-year-old from Chennai who followed her passion a decade ago, and now cooks your in-flight biryani

thirty thousand feet above the ground, bored and hungry, if you are eating a cup of hot biryani or analogyYou have Radha Daga to thank. The 79-year-old woman from Chennai started her ready-to-eat food business nearly a decade ago. Their brand, Triguni Is Eats, is now available on IndiGo and Air Asia India flights, on Amazon and retail stores across the country, and in Singapore and Malaysia.

“I don’t think like an entrepreneur. They look at generating revenue and profit and loss. I got into my business without thinking about whether it would make money,” says Radha, smiling.

While her current occupation was derived from her love of cooking, she came into her first occupation helping women. He established his first textile import business in 1987 in Chennai. “It was also started to generate employment for women. I am happy to train people and see that they are getting better and living better, dressing better and eating better,” she says. By 2009, Radha was determined to enter the food business.

While on vacation with her husband in America, she found a magazine advertising ready-to-eat pasta. All I had to do was add hot water. The idea stuck with him.

Upon his return to India, he wondered: What about Cup-o-Idli? She bought a dehydrating machine and found a chef who worked in the flight kitchen. Together they started making idlis. But after months of trial and error, he realized that some idlis were not hydrating properly with hot water.

Radha gave up on idli and tried other combinations. The Lemon Rice and Biryani were instant hits and lifted the company both literally and figuratively. ready to eat tamarind rice and analogy followed.

“Food is cooked in the same way that normal food is prepared, and then it goes through a process [for dehydration and preservation] Which I cannot disclose,” laughs Radha.

Around that time, an Indigo Airlines representative saw Triguni As Eats biryani in a cup and was excited to see that it was ready to eat with just hot water – it takes eight minutes. In 2012, IndiGo expressed interest in Radha’s product for in-flight meals, but wanted it to work on packaging to make it convenient for the crew. The airline is now its largest customer, purchasing 85% of its total production.

Triguni Eze Eats makes its products to order, as they are particular about shelf life. “We have the capacity to pack 16,000 to 18,000 tubs a day. Before the first lockdown we were shipping 13,000 tubs a day between the airline and the domestic market,” she says.

analogy, Dal rice, rice and beans And biryanis are hot favourites. analogy And biryani is produced every day.

Finding Customers on the Ground

Last September, as soon as the lockdown was eased, he shifted his focus to trains. His new line has Pongal Sambar, moong dal Porridge and Spices analogy₹85 for 230 grams (and 250 grams after rehydration). Meanwhile, other experiments are continuing at Triguni Foods factory in Thiruvarkadu.

“When I started this business at the age of 69, I didn’t want any loan,” says Radha. Things were going smoothly till demonetisation in 2016. It took time to recover.

Last year during the pandemic and lockdown when she managed to get back on the saddle. With almost zero air travel, and people cooking themselves at home, her ready-to-eat meals were not on retail customers’ shopping lists. “For most people, the priority was ordering groceries, fruits and vegetables.” It added up in a jiffy. “Pre-pandemic (2019-2020) our business was 16 crores. February and March 2020 were negative. 2020-2021 We closed at around 5 crores as both the airline and the market corrected only after December 2020.

But after November 15, things are coming back on track. “I am shipping a million tubs a week now. These go to IRCTC, airlines, and are in demand by travelers and students as well,” says Radha. She believes the reason is convenience and the fact that it is the closest thing to home food. Radha is now excited about the future, especially because she believes, “I have a great product.”

Photos: B Jothi Ramalingam