Connoisseur’s delight

His family loves exotic food combinations. So something like Navarro asparagus with hollandaise sauce or roasted turkey followed by traditional Parsi dhansak is regular Sunday fare. Maybe that’s where Rishad Mehta gets his ‘foodie’ genes from. “When it comes to food, we’re fairly hybrid,” says Rishad who after finishing his graduation from Babson College in Boston, started foodzig.com, a website that delivers global foods.

“The inspiration for foodzig was less an idea and more an opportunity to create a great product and experience. I wanted to give customers direct access to high-end foods from the comfort of their homes at non-inflated MRP prices,” states Rishad.

His focus right now is on high quality meats and cheeses. His favourites, “Serrano or cooked ham for breakfast and Holland’s smoked cheese or Camembert with a ‘good night’ glass of wine to put the day behind.”

The website has some great photography and content that includes recipes and descriptions on how to use a product and get the best out of it. The design is simple and his writing, crisp and witty. For its name, Rishad just went by his intuition. “My only fear was that people would pronounce the ‘Z’ as a ‘J’ like foodjhig, but I got over that and used it anyway.”

The website is barely three months old and without any marketing, it’s got over 30,000 hits in its first few days. “It’s an indication that what I am trying to do is worthwhile and resonating with the market,” he says.

After a long, tiring day, he usually heads for a swim or plays badminton. “Adding some sports in your schedule takes away a lot of the stress and allows you to think clearly. Weekends are not really weekends when you are an entrepreneur but whenever time permits, I hang out with friends, eat at good restaurants and visit the occasional bar.”