August 12, 2025 • 52 mins
In this engaging conversation, Sandhya Kumar shares her unique journey from a traditional culinary background to becoming a food designer and R&D leader at the Future Food Institute. She discusses her early experiences in the hotel industry, the challenges she faced, and how her passion for food led her to explore food styling and film production. Sandhya emphasizes the importance of sustainability and regenerative practices in the food industry, highlighting the role of chefs in advocating for change. She reflects on the evolving landscape of food design and the impact of younger generations on food systems, ultimately expressing her commitment to continue her work in this dynamic field.
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Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Sandhya Kumar and Her Journey
01:07 Early Career and Culinary Education
03:13 Experiences in Hotel Kitchens
07:05 Transitioning from Kitchen to Food Styling
10:23 Food Styling in Film Production
11:46 Navigating Challenges in the Culinary World
15:46 Reflections on Integrity and Career Choices
16:37 Navigating the Hospitality Industry
18:24 The Fast-Paced World of Food Consulting
20:42 The Impact of the Pandemic on Career Choices
22:27 Pursuing Education in Food Design
24:43 Teaching and Promoting Healthy Eating
26:55 The Journey into Food Innovation
30:01 Reflections on Education and Career Paths
33:04 The Hidden Skills of Chefs
34:31 Understanding Future Food Institute
37:02 The Role of Food Design
39:41 Innovating for Sustainability
42:31 Regenerative Practices in Food Systems
44:56 Connecting Through Food
49:27 Empowering the Next Generation of Food Innovators
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
So hello everyone and welcome back to Fugitive Chef's podcast.
Today we have Sandhya Kumar and Sandhya is actually a fellow
Indian, the first Indian actually on the podcast, which
is funny because I have approached some, but somehow it
happened to be that I didn't getanybody on board.
Also the first woman on the season and that's quite
unfortunate. I have to look for more female
profiles. I think there's a lot of there's
(00:20):
a big chunk of like women out there who are doing some great
work like Sandhya. Sandhya will tell us more about
what she does. But from what I know, Sandhya
works at the Future Food Institute, which also is a
coincidence because we work withclosely with Future Food and
many projects. I've worked with Alessandro and
people, other people from the institute on projects primarily
in Japan. We have a gastronomy innovation
campus in Tokyo and there we arelike we are working on the more
(00:41):
food tech side of things, whereas Future Food is on the
regenerative cities kind of things.
But yeah, I mean, Sandhya after all, is from what I saw from the
website, you're AR and D chef and A food designer.
And that's the whole part of thepodcast, right?
Because we have people who are into these, I would say, niche
kind of jobs or also roles that have been made for these kind of
profiles like us, right? But before we dig into all of
(01:02):
that, Sandhya, I would like to know how did you end up in food?
Like, what was it? When where did it start?
It's a very long journey. It started in 2018, so we're
going to go back in history like15 years back.
But just want to say thank you. Thank you so much for coming,
for having me here. And I'm going to be sending you
a list of all the women you should be doing.
(01:23):
Please, that would be amazing. Please please do that.
There's so many people out here doing so many cool stuff.
Really it's with the job that I have right now.
It's a great opportunity. The kind of people I get to meet
right now, it's so inspiring. It's every day you're learning
something from each and every person.
So it's it's really cool what people are doing out here right
(01:43):
now. So it's really interesting.
But yes, I started my journey back in India.
I did my culinary school, hoodlemanagement, actually three years
of hoodle management. I knew I wanted to be a chef
when I was 15. So I really, really focused on
getting myself into the institute, into the university.
(02:03):
And I really knew I wanted to work in in hotels and
restaurants. So towards the end of my final
year in the university, I was already with a job in hand.
I was going to go to The Four Seasons.
It was the first Four Seasons tocome into India.
So it was a luxury property. It's a very big brand.
So it was so exciting, you know,to start your, you know, first
(02:24):
career, first job in such a big brand.
It was kind of natural, right? You do the whole management, you
get into the hotel and you startworking there.
But I'm going to interrupt you there over Sunday because I
mean, I think this is very interesting for me because I
have like clarified this a lot of times when because I was from
a Chimbabwe, I started hotel management.
And that was because I think it's only in India, but there
(02:45):
are cities, for example, I was last like now at work, I'm very
often in Tokyo. And they're also like, I was
talking to restaurant entrepreneurs and they were
like, yeah, I have a restaurant in this 50 story building.
Whereas in Europe that's the shittiest restaurant you can go
to if it's in a massive building.
And at the same time, in India, all the good restaurants are in
hotels, right? Which is I think I understand,
because that's the kind of clientele, that's the kind of
clientele who would afford that meal is living there.
(03:06):
So it's. Funny for me because we.
We. Look up to these hotel
restaurants which I think do great jobs, but over here you
never look. I mean, there are very few
exceptions in. Spain, for example.
Yeah, you don't look at the reference of like the standalone
restaurants are a thing which ishappening in India also now.
But I just want to clarify this,that it's, it's funny.
True way true. I mean, we both now in India
that you see, it's this, it's been the last maybe 3 or 4 years
(03:29):
that you see standalone restaurants are coming up or
popping up and having the same, you know, talking point or
stability that you see with the five star hotel.
So getting into a five star or abig chain group meant that, OK,
you have job security, you have,you know, a good starting point.
So that was that was establishedlike that, you know, 15 years
ago. Oh yes.
(03:50):
So it was very obvious for me toget into one of those.
It was either Four Seasons or itwas going to the Oberois or Taj,
you know, one of those large that was the picture that was
given. You know, you never knew about
Michelin restaurants. You never knew about stand
alone. It didn't kind of exist that
kind of culture, the Nexus. So and also staying with the
company for a long time, right? So if you stay 10 years in the
(04:12):
company, they show that, OK, you've been loyal.
So you kind of stick to it and you don't kind of change jobs
and jump from 2 restaurants to the other one.
But you see now it's, it's not something that was very common
back then. So yes, I started in 2008 with
The Four Seasons and I worked inthat company till 2014.
So 8 years I spend with, with the company.
(04:33):
But the interest interesting part of me is I was already kind
of stepping out of the kitchen when I was working in Four
Seasons. So I was very passionate about
photography. So I started doing, I went to
study photography since I was passionate about it.
I was like, OK, let me just takeit as a hobby or study
something. So I went to National Institute
(04:53):
of Bombay, National Institute ofPhotography in Bombay and then
I, I was doing night shifts so that I could go to classes
during the day. So this is how it's kind of so
in a way it is flexible. The hotel, I mean, my chefs are
very flexible. OK, you want to study?
OK, you go do you can, we can do.
So 3-4 months. I was continuously doing night
shift. I was only saying, yeah, this is
(05:16):
how I did. And I started photography.
It was more of just to learn howto, you know, get the pictures.
So it was never about food or anything that perspective.
And one of the professors in my photography class were like, so
you're a chef, you must be doingfood styling.
And I'm like, you mean food plating?
And I said, yes, I do food plating.
It's something that is very normal for us in the restaurant.
(05:37):
No, no, no, I meant food styling.
And I was like, I don't know what you're talking about.
So he said he then he showed me these profiles of really cool
food stylist and they were like,you know, they do this for, you
know, brands for commercial brand photography.
And I was like, OK, I mean, it'slooks easy to do.
I mean, doesn't look so comfortable complicated.
And they were like, OK, would you mind doing some of the, you
(05:59):
know, sessions for us? I was like, OK, And they said
they'll pay me. I said OK, you know, you will
get an extra income. I don't mind.
Yeah. So I went ahead and did some
styling for the brand photography classes that they
were having on the site. So I was, you know, working on
setting up the tables, plating the food in a way.
And I was working still with food.
(06:19):
OK, Nothing artificial yet. So then they also taught me in
in a way that you don't really use food for food photography,
you use other things. And then I kind of started
exploring that area. So instead of milk, you were
using white glue to let this, for example, it was a cereal
shooter, Kellogg's cereal photo and you want them to float on
(06:42):
top, right? And if you put it in milk, it
basically sinks. So I was like, OK, so I was
learning tricks like that from them.
And then I was like, OK, you know, went back to the hotel and
I was like, you know, I'm doing this.
And this is something that we could also do for the magazines
of the hotel and we could reallymake the you know, so we have in
house photographers, we have in house sales and marketing team
(07:03):
pushing me to all of their big hotels.
So they already have a banned portfolio you have to follow.
So I was starting to input and help, you know, things like that
in, in the hotel. And then at one point I, I
stopped being in the kitchen because of a personal issue
with, with one of the chefs. So he's from New Zealand.
He was a bit racist with me. And I was like, I cannot, I was
(07:26):
ready to quit the company. This is one of the reasons why I
really still love being in touchwith the people of The Four
Seasons. So they had such, I don't know
how do you say such clarity about the issue and they knew
how to handle it because there was no evidence of how he was
being, you know, manipulative or, you know, being targeting me
through the this kind of racistic comments.
(07:48):
They removed me from working under him.
So they gave me another positionin the hotel where I could work
as I was working with the food and beverage director, I was
working with the general manager, I was working with this
photographer already. So I was already doing a bit of
being the bridge between the kitchen and the to the
departments where it kind of a position that never existed.
So they created the space for mewhere I could still do be in
(08:11):
touch with food, but be the right connection, you know,
between these all departments. So and it's very important also
where you need to interact with the exhibition chef and tell
them chef, I need these kind of,you know, images and things that
need to go out or I need to connect with the, you know, the
suppliers for this purpose and things like that.
So I was becoming sort of a chefwho knew all the things that how
it functions inside, but being the kind of connecting point for
(08:35):
all these other departments. So in this is I, this is how I
started kind of stepping out of the kitchen, you know,
traditional kitchen format. And but I never stopped being a
cook, I think, and I never stopped being a cooking food or
not being in the kitchen. But and then due to other
personal reasons, I quit Four Seasons, not, not because I
didn't want to be with the company.
(08:55):
I moved back home. I moved back to Kerala where I'm
from in the South of India. So I moved to my home city and I
took kind of a break and then I,I was kind of lost.
I, I was doing something that I really enjoyed.
I really loved being in that space.
And suddenly I was away from allof those things that gave me
comfort and happiness. And it was very difficult
(09:15):
finding your footing. You know, when you are, it's
home, but still you don't feel like you're sitting in that
perspective. So I started doing very small
ways. I started doing classes,
workshops. I was doing small events,
private events for other people.And then I started in that small
(09:36):
way. I started a company of my own.
OK. So food styling was also there,
a bit of it, you know, doing some food styling work for
people. And then I get a call from
someone, some random person saying that, you know, we doing
a movie and we want you to be doing the food.
And I was like, yeah, yeah, I knew it was.
(09:57):
I really thought it was a joke calling from this production
company, blah blah blah. And I was like, okay, somebody
from Bombay, one of my old friends is cracking me up and
okay, yeah, thank you, yeah, okay, okay, cool, okay, yeah, I
get the same call and it's like,okay, this sounds a bit serious
now. And I'm like, okay, so you want,
they wanted a meeting and I was like, okay.
And then it was they were going to do the remake of the
(10:21):
Hollywood movie, John Flower's the food truck movie.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So they the, the apparently this
director got the rights to remake it in the Bollywood
version. So I was like, they wanted me to
be part of the food styling. Somebody had recommended me from
somebody who was in Four Seasonsand knew about the work that I
was doing, kind of recommended me.
And I was like, it was one of the big work that I did.
(10:44):
And through this whole movie, I was, you know, travelling with
the whole crew, six months on shoot locations.
I was working with Saif Ali Khanand Padma Priya, really two
major, you know, Bollywood actors at the time.
I was like a completely different experience.
No, you're yeah, I'm cooking sometimes behind, you know, sets
(11:06):
in a back of the sets with like portable kitchens and doing
food. And.
And the thing was almost all of the food in that movie was real.
And because the director was like, no, I don't want any fake
stuff that you do for or, you know, those brand photography
for food glue make food like really good.
I want them to really enjoy and eat.
And I want those expressions to come out.
(11:26):
So OK, no pressure at all. You need to make food look good
and taste good on camera and forpeople to eat.
So that was really enjoyable. And it was something that I
really love doing just out of mycomfort zone completely.
Yeah. No kitchen to cook in, no faking
stuff. So it was, it was something very
interesting for me. That's super funny.
(11:46):
Like you've had a a lot of pivots, right.
You've had like so many pivots through like through your hotel
jobs and I mean. For me it's very.
Interesting. Yeah, no, it just happens to be
and I mean for me that's the interesting point that I think
there is there's something natural in like something you do
with food that there are opportunities to pivot and it's
just the right people who know when is the right time to do it.
But for me it's interesting. I would like to like a little go
(12:07):
back to hotels as such, because the reason I was, for example, I
was never a big fan of hotels because I was in, in Grand Hyatt
when I was doing my, the industrial traineeship in the
second year. And then I had, yeah.
And then there's the typical management training programs,
you know, so I had, I had one with the Park Hotel, I had with
the Taj. And then there were CLD and all
these things. And for me, what happened is
very early on, especially when Iwas in, in IHM, I started
(12:30):
working with Alex Sanchez at thetable with together with
together with College in the evenings.
And that's where I got a touch of the things that I felt what
he was doing, the exposure he had, for example, being in a
stand alone was very different from what I felt hotels were
looking me for. Like for me in the interviews or
in what was explained to me about hotels, I felt like they
have people who can cook, they have people who can run their
operations every day. They need somebody who knows how
(12:51):
to use a computer. They don't need somebody who can
make duty rosters, who can make.At least that was my perception
of how hotel restaurants in India work.
And that is a very unfair perception because I've not been
in them working on payroll. So for me, I want to know that
part because for me, that's whatdrove me to say, you know what,
I'd rather go to somewhere whereI'm actually being a cook and
not being also seen because a lot of these hotels, what I felt
(13:12):
is these cooks who have not gonethrough formal education have a
very negative perception towardspeople who are coming from hotel
management schools and entering these kitchens.
So it's a very, the politics is very high, the energy is not the
best position to be in. So for me, it felt like a very
big picture and I'll be a small puzzle in the big picture and I
would rather be something big insomething really small.
So how was that experience for you of working in hotels?
So that was the interesting thing about 4C, wherein I think
(13:35):
the level of the chefs in the kitchen were a bit different.
So there was, you know, yes, there were a few people who were
coming from, OK, not official training or they were just cooks
who just had experience and their food was, you know, the
talking. But there are also people who
are coming from, you know, schools like us as well.
(13:56):
And then that was the interesting part about Four
Seasons was like they didn't want to know whether you knew
how to do an omelette or they didn't ask you whether you knew
how to do the, you know, the mayonnaise and the hollandaise.
They didn't ask you, you come, you learn the way we do it.
And you know, so they put you through the training processes.
They had a really cool, you know, onboarding process where
(14:19):
in the six months, sorry, for meit was 18 months because I did
the onboarding for 18 months where you go through every phase
of the kitchen, every departmentin the kitchen.
And it kind of gave me a good foundation.
So I also did my training internship before with the
Auberoi. So I knew I saw the difference.
I saw how different the way you were taught was.
(14:39):
And of course the politics is there.
Being a girl is not easy. You were like one girl in that
one whole kitchen. There was another girl in the
Japanese kitchen and there was another girl in the Chinese
kitchen. Indian kitchen, no girls.
Pastry, Yes, you will find more girls in pastry, but this was so
if you talk more to a person, there is always like, oh, she's
always talking to this, you know, the there was always these
(15:01):
kind of frictions that you'd kind of learn to navigate
around. And I think one being a girl and
one being like very young in theindustry, you find your ways to
deal with these kind of situations and stuff.
But luckily I was in a very goodcompany with Four Seasons, so I
didn't really suffer a lot of those negative, you know,
(15:24):
things. There was there.
There were definitely one, but not too much.
Like for me, the worst was beingyou know, losing my integrity
was something that I wouldn't want to sacrifice on.
So that's where I stopped. I said I will quit because I
can't work with this person withthis the chef, the the person
was very I was picking and it picking on me for every single
(15:45):
thing said I I will not lose my integrity there.
So that's when I decided I'm leaving the company.
It's OK. I had a good, it was already
around 6-6 years by then with the company and that's, I think
they also saw how I was in the past year.
So they believed in what I was as a person.
So they gave me that opportunity.
OK, don't leave. Let's put you away from this
(16:07):
whole situation. And, you know, they gave me that
position of, you know, being a coordinator, being the food
styling, doing all of those things that I still love to do,
you know, take, you know, they gave that opportunity to me.
And unfortunately, the guy who was targeting me lost his job in
the next 6 months. So I was like, can I go back to
the kitchen now, please? Yeah.
He listen to this. He was for another exactly for
(16:29):
another issue where he was harassing another employee.
He was quite, I mean, there was proof.
And then it was he was sad. Yeah.
So in a way, I felt like I was not in a very toxic environment
all throughout. So I had seniors or supervisors
about me who I could approach and say, see, this is not
working for me or I need to stepaway from this kind of
(16:50):
situation. I mean, we were still putting in
14 hours, 15 hours long shifts, early mornings, night shifts,
all of that was still there. But that is something that we
are we, I know I kind of felt just part of the job, right?
I mean, you are told that you don't have 8 hour shifts when
you work in a hotel. It's something that comes as a
disclaimer to your, you know, contract.
(17:11):
I feel those were not something that I felt was an issue.
And I was young, I had the energy, I could work.
I mean, I didn't mind and I feltlike maybe if I stayed that one
hour extra, maybe the chef will show me how to really do the do
the pizza dough or the, you know, the bread and this this
recipe, a special sauce or something like that.
So you didn't mind for the learning sake of it, you would
(17:32):
give up that one hour where you just go back home no problem.
No, totally. I think your experience is super
enriching. I think it's it's very unique in
itself because I mean it's very subjective.
I think all experiences are subjective.
And I think there's a lot of pros of working in hotels.
Also, it's a very organized thatsomebody take care of you.
You have your uniforms iron whenyou walk in.
There's a lot of benefits of andI think especially in a country
like India, I feel a lot of people who I speak to now,
(17:53):
friends from back during collegedays, I speak to them.
And I think what also I think leads to people tending to go to
hotels because at least in Europe, where I'm right now,
there is a basic health care structure, there's a pension
plan, there's a government that cares for you, what has the
resources to care for you. I don't think, I don't think
Indian government doesn't want to.
It's just I think it's too, too big a population to manage with
too very little taxpayers. So I feel in that sense, hotels
(18:15):
provide this kind of a Plan B orsomething outside the system
that helps. So I think, yeah, that's also,
you know, everybody has their own context to, to, to build
what they find their preference to be.
But for you, Sandhya, for example, because I mean, in
India, it's, it's not like food designing is new, you know,
because I remember when I was inschool, a family friend, a
cousin of mine is very good friends with Michael Swami.
And I had a chat with him and he's like a very established
(18:37):
food designer, photographer and things like that.
So did you, did you plan to likeafter experience with being in a
movie with Seth and things like that?
Did you think of, I don't know, building a brand for yourself or
specializing that or making a brand for yourself, you know,
being an entrepreneur in that sense, or why did that lead you
to? To be honest, everything
happened too fast for me. Everything happened after the
movie. Everything was happening very
(18:57):
fast already. I was working as a consultant
for restaurants, so I was helping with, you know, other
entrepreneurs setting up restaurants in different parts
of the city or different parts of the state.
So I was travelling already for a lot of things.
When on the movie thing came into the picture, I was, luckily
I didn't have any commitment projects in, in one location.
So I was travelling with the crew six months I was on the
(19:19):
road. So coming back, I think I, it
was like, OK, you know, you are on newspapers, you are on
articles. It's, it's like you have an
explosion. People are just, they want to
work with you. So I was having a lot of TV
commercials, doing TV commercials, photography.
So it was work after work and then consultancy also.
That's when I did one big project for BMW Mini Cooper.
(19:41):
We set up the restaurant. They wanted to get into urban
lifestyle. I mean, they have the car
showrooms and they want to plug in a cafe and a lifestyle part
of it into it. And I designed the whole cafe
for them. So all of this was just
happening one after the other where you didn't have the time
to kind of reflect this. Is this what I want to do?
I mean, is this the direction I want to go?
(20:01):
I mean. I've been doing so many things.
There was no moment to reflect. So there's no moment to ask
yourself, no moment to kind of evaluate or build a brand or you
know, I had the Instagram profile and I just kept sharing,
you know, making reels or photosand that was it.
That was the only kind of marketing or something that I
did because before I finish one project, I'm jumping to another
(20:22):
one parallely. So it was like that.
The moment I stopped was during pandemic, so 2020, like
everybody was told to sit at home.
So I was like in a way happy, sorry to say this, but I was so
happy that I didn't have to, youknow, run out of house and, you
know, drive another 4 hours to the next client.
So it was good for one month because then I again getting
(20:45):
calls from my client. What do we do with the
restaurant? What do we do with this?
We are losing money. We're doing that.
I'm like, OK, so you know, it, it, it was like going back into
that loop again. So it was like, OK, let's now
switch to cloud kitchen model. Let's now do the delivery
system. How good can we do the
deliveries? How can we make it different?
You know, it was exhausting. So it was, I knew at that time,
(21:06):
OK, I don't want to do this for the next 10 years.
I didn't want to continue like this.
I didn't find any happiness in going to this set, you know, and
these sets, working in sets are like worse than working in
restaurants. You start at 6:00 in the
morning, early in the morning, and sometimes the last shot is
finishing at one or two in the night.
(21:27):
So you are there the whole day. Next day, you have no energy to
get up. So it was even more exhausting
than working in restaurants. But it's just one day probably.
So you don't do it every day. And yes, it does come with a
good amount of money. I'm not disagreeing on that.
But still, I didn't want to continue doing that for the rest
of my life. It didn't feel any, you know, I
(21:49):
didn't feel any. This wasn't my goal.
It it didn't feel like this is something that I want to
continue doing. So that's when I started looking
for food design, you know, so I wanted to study something and I
didn't know what I wanted to study, to be honest.
Food design, food styling. OK, maybe I thought, OK, I can
make my art better. Maybe I can, you know, know,
learn how to be better at building a brand image, you
(22:11):
know, things, things like that. OK, I'll Start learning that.
That's when I kind of stumbled upon the food design innovation
here with the Scholar Polytechnica in Milan.
So I came across that. I actually came across that
couple of years ago, but it was not, you know, in full decision
that that I was like, what the time to go and study.
I have so many projects, I have so many clients.
(22:32):
So I went back to that during the pandemic time and I was
like, OK, maybe this is the time, you know, I can take a
break for for a year, do this masters then come back and you
know, it'll have some values that I can probably incorporate
another company that I'm trying to build or something.
So this was my intention when I moved to Italy 3 1/2 years ago.
(22:53):
When I came here, I was like, OK, something new, open.
I was 31 when I came here, so I was like nobody my age is gonna
be there, It's OK. It was a bit of a bit strange
situation where I am sitting with 20 year olds, 19 year olds,
you know, and they are already coming from design backgrounds
and talking about this. I mean, it was a bit surreal for
(23:15):
me to be in that kind of an environment after 1015 years,
for 12-13 years, he left university 2008, and now he is
suddenly sitting in the same environment.
It was a bit surreal for me at that time, yeah.
I mean, what happened for me during the course was that I
learned that I'm doing all of the things that they're talking
(23:36):
about, you know, so they were talking about local food.
They were talking about, you know, community and, you know,
sustainability. I didn't use these words.
I didn't know how to use these words probably, but I was
already doing that. So there's this project that I
was working on back home before the pandemic.
It was with the school. It was it belonged to a friend
(23:57):
of mine and it was a private school, but he was like,
Sandhya, I want you to come and teach them about food.
So I was like, OK, so the idea was to kind of set up a canteen
where they start eating, you know, early healthy food already
the campus was on a 0 waste to 0plastic.
They had already those kind of ideologies.
So just kind of easing into it. And there was, so I went to each
(24:20):
and every classroom and I spoke to them about eating local
nutritionals, meal healthy meals, balancing your, balancing
your food, why you need to eat your, you know, jackfruit, mango
and bananas and your beans. And, and it was very simple
coming from my personal knowledge.
I didn't study about the sustainability.
I didn't, I didn't study about the SDG goals that we are so
(24:42):
focused right now on. And the time the intention was
feed good food, the kids healthyfood.
You know, that was the only goal.
And then we, I went into teaching women who are working
in the school. We have the system in your
schools, right Aya, who is always with the kids in the
classrooms with the lunch box and helping with the kids.
So from younger classrooms basically.
(25:04):
I mean you are in five, 5th, 5thclass and 4th class and stuff.
And these ladies were all from the local community.
So I taught them to make kimchi,I taught them to make hummus,
you know, making balanced nutritional meals every day for
lunch. So we set up a canteen where we
removed all those fried food, the, the cutlets in the, and the
(25:26):
snacks that you have from bakery.
All of that was omitted, completely removed.
And this is the, this is the meat you will have every day.
And the, the ladies, the chichi's were making the food
every day and they had these plates.
So not to focus on plastic. We had the steel plates that can
be reused, you know, all these kind of, and there was a farm in
(25:46):
the school as well. So there were vegetables like
tapioca that were, you know, taken from the farm that the
students did farming there. So they were, you know, taught
all of these things. And at that time I had no, you
know, official learning on SDG goals or sustainability.
And I was doing these things basically when I came to Milan
(26:07):
and I was doing all all these professors then coming to talk
to you about agro economy and, you know, the sustainable
agriculture and this and that. And I was like, OK, these are
things that I've been doing there.
But now I kind of got a kind of a structure to it.
I kind of got defined, like I got definitions for all the
things that I was doing. So I was like, OK, maybe this is
(26:27):
something that I can take back. You know, this is so the goal
was always go back to India, continue what I was doing.
But now I have all these words. That you know.
Theologies that I can. Yeah, yeah.
New tools to kind of tell the way I am.
The storytelling can kind of change, right.
So the way he was talking about it.
So. But then I had to do the
internship as well with the masters.
So when I was looking for the internship is when I saw Future
(26:51):
Food Institute. But because one of the directors
was also a professor there, so she was teaching us food design,
of course. And then I was like, OK, because
I didn't want to go back to a restaurant.
I mean, they were offering a restaurant, you know, because
you're a chef, maybe you can of course do your internship in a
restaurant. And I was like, yeah, you still
come from that mentality. No, I don't want to work in a
(27:11):
standard owned restaurant. Yeah.
And I didn't want to do that again in Italy because I already
know how a kitchen functions, how it should work, what are the
problems? I understand those things.
So I didn't, I think I didn't. I felt like I didn't have
anything to learn from there. So I decided I'll go with the
Future Food Institute. I mean, when I did the
(27:33):
interview, it was with one of the bus culinary school products
as well. So he was the manager of the
food alchemist lab that I'm leading now.
So he was the manager food scientist.
So coming from the gastronomy scientist background, Spanish.
I remember the name of this guy.He was the Masters.
Of no, it's Paco French. Paco, Paco, Paco.
Paco, Paco, Paco. So Paco a real scientist.
(27:56):
So I see him first time in a in a lab court and I was like, Oh
my God, this is not what I should be doing.
This is not where I should be looking for an internship.
And he was talking to me about Aspergillus, orizi and
rhizosporus. And I was like, can't even
pronounce those things. So he told me to go back to kind
of research. So never done research in my
(28:16):
life. I mean, in terms of scientific
research, never done scientific research in my career.
So I went back and, you know, itwas completely new.
Everything that I explored, learnt was completely new for
me. And he was like, this is what I
want. I don't want you to come with a
science background. I don't want you to tell me
(28:36):
which bacteria, which fungi, nothing.
I want what you have. So it's like, OK, so it felt a
bit more easy to getting into the job there.
Yeah. So I did my internship.
I learned everything about fermentation that I right now do
from there, from the Future FoodInstitute, from Francis
Francisco, I mean, from Paco forabout commentation about
handling bacteria and working with fungi and Koji and me.
(28:58):
So everything that I know right now is coming here and learning.
So for me, the journey, I don't think I took those, OK, this is
what I want to do. It just came to me in a way and
I just went with it. And I, I, it was my instinct.
I think, OK, I want to do this and I don't want to do this.
This doesn't feel right. This is what I feel I think I
can do. I will try it.
So it was kind of carving my ownway or path towards things and
(29:23):
it, it, it kind of fit And I, ifI felt comfort, if I felt like
I'm doing good, I kind of stuck around.
And I think that's what I've done.
I've been here for the last three years, 3 1/2, four years
now. And now I'm this place where I'm
leading the food alchemist lab and I'm working with scientists
and I'm working with anthropologists, I'm working
with, you know, indigenous people.
I'm working with so many different backgrounds and it's
(29:46):
only been enriching every, everystep, you know, So I don't
really have any kind of this thing that the hotel industry
didn't do me good, but it gave me all the right foundation or
the right things that I needed to be here right now, I feel.
Because yeah, yeah. And for you, I mean, what do you
recommend? Because I think it's super
interesting because there are people who are like interested
(30:07):
in food design, you know, like we have a master's over here now
which, which we have seen like students from, there's always
curiosity about like how food design works.
But I would love to know like your experience, how the course
was and how much of design like because you have faced that
first hand, you know, like how much design do you need to know
to get into a course of of that sort?
Do you recommend that as somebody who's say in your
position before doing that Masters?
(30:27):
The thing is, I felt like a lot of people had.
I mean, my personal thing was for me, it was good because I
was doing things without knowingwhat I was doing, right.
So I didn't have that structure.I didn't have that storytelling
knowledge. I didn't have.
This is the way you communicate about sustainability.
This is what sustainability is about.
I didn't have this, these tools that you have right now and it
(30:51):
kind of empowered me to be honest, from a chef to how going
through this masters gave me theright language to advocate what
I really wanted to communicate. I think it helped me, but I'm
sure some people felt like it was redundant because they came
from design schools. You basically went through
(31:12):
design thinking methodology. The thing is, design thinking
methodology for me is something that everybody does in a, in a,
in a natural way. We always explore our then we
come down to, OK, this is what you know, you narrow it down,
you converge. So design thinking is something
that we all everybody naturally is doing, but it's something
(31:33):
that you never taught. Like this is what design
thinking is or this is what thisthis methodology is.
So it gave me structure in a lotof ways the the course, the
masters. So I would still recommend, but
if it's only big only if you arelooking for something outside of
that traditional kitchen. I mean, there are people still
love going into Michelin restaurants and working for
(31:55):
large companies or there's stillpeople who love doing that.
So for them, I don't think, I don't know if it is valuable,
but yes, for people who are looking for something more than
just being in a kitchen, being just a chef and the person who
gives you all these options, OK,I want to work on food culture.
I want to work on food identity.I want to work when I know with
(32:18):
experiences, I want to work in, you know, connect people through
education. So you understand there are
there's so many parallels. You can still work with food,
but in different ways. So I think that kind of opens up
when you do this kind of a master.
So definitely, I know BCC started this year, right?
I mean this last year with the master's program.
Yeah, with Elsa. Elsa is a food designer.
(32:40):
She's she's leading this programof, of food design.
Yeah. I think it's a very different
view on food design, very much based.
I think it's not, I would say it's not so much about
connecting cultures and anthropology.
It's more about yeah, I think it's more about experience
based. So like we are doing projects
which are like we made a clinic for sugar detox.
So how sugar can be can be lowered just by sensory science.
So it's a lot of combination I would say not just food design,
(33:01):
but sensory science and how you play with colours and textures
and things like that to kind of change behaviour.
But it's super interesting for me this new and it's it's
correctly what you said. I think chefs do bring a
different skill of set of skills, which maybe are not very
documented and they're very learned.
They're very subjective also. But that's the whole part of the
podcast. Because I feel like a lot of
people, like a lot of people whowrite through the podcast or who
(33:21):
I speak to, who find themselves in this position where they feel
like they are somehow they they could contribute more.
But the current structure, be ita hotel or restaurant, is not
giving that kind of outlet. I feel they undervalue a lot of
skills they already have. Like, for example, like people
who said you, they offered the role for doing the production
with the movie or say doing those brand deals.
(33:42):
I think these people saw something in you which
subconsciously we ourselves don't see it because we've
normalized so much of like just knowing what food goes with what
or what color goes with what, what texture would, how acidity
would would kind of balance it out.
You know, I think these are skills which are not documented
because they come from experience.
They don't come from the school either.
But that's why I asked you this question because I think people
hearing should know that. I mean, the idea of the podcast
(34:04):
also is that people who listen to your story feel more
relatable. OK, Because I think if somebody,
if I myself go on the website offuture food, see you over there,
I was like, I'll be like, OK, maybe I can't as somebody who's
coming out of school, that meansI have to do like 10,000 masters
or a PhD to enter up in a Research Institute, you know, so
it's about showing these these possibilities.
So yeah, it's very enriching to hear this.
(34:24):
And next I would like to hear from you what is Future Food
Institute for people who don't know it?
And what's your everyday work like today?
It's a big, it's a big question,I mean.
Yes, it is, actually. It's one of the most difficult
questions to answer, to be honest.
Yeah. So your parents know what you
do? Because for me, that's a
(34:44):
interesting question because my parents, I think, don't
completely know what I do. I've tried explaining them what
I do, but they'd always say, OK,yeah.
But you were last week in Egypt teaching kids how to eat, and
now you're in Japan consulting Apackaging company on how they
should create a packaging for crisps.
So I think, yeah, for me, how would you explain, say, somebody
who doesn't know anything about food that's more interesting?
(35:04):
Like dumb it down the most you can.
Oh wow. So I struggle the most to
explain my job to people who don't come from the food
industry in general. You know, So my boyfriend is a
software engineer. So if I'm meeting his friends, I
just say I'm a chef. I'm stop there because if I say
food designer, they don't understand food design.
(35:26):
You design plates or you design something and it's like, it's
very exhausting. And the conversation just goes
into so many things because I have to tell them the whole
history of what is food designer, why food designer, why
I'm a chef and A food designer. I just don't go there.
Sometimes I just say I'm a chef,but I work for this company,
nonprofit organization, and they're like, okay, so they're
(35:51):
understanding. That's okay with my parents.
It's so funny because my parentsnever really know what I'm
doing. Yeah, they know I'm doing a lot
of things because even from likewhen I was doing the food
styling, when I was doing the movie, they're like, OK, I'm
doing the restaurant, then I'm doing the styling and today I'm
in shoot. So don't call me.
I can't pick up the phone. So they are, they kind of know
(36:12):
to let me be. They know I'm I'm doing things
that I really like and they knowI'm happy and they just let me
be there. They know I'm working for this
company called Future Food Institute.
She's teaching, she's cooking, she's fermenting.
They understand fermentation. My mom really curious about
kombucha and she, she's done kombucha when she was a very
young girl. So she was like, I know this.
(36:32):
And there is this, you know, skin that forms on top.
I played with it. And so I was like, so there are
a lot of the, you know, connections that I do have with
them in that terms of way. But really the core of, you
know, my, what I'm trying to advocate, probably not so much
because if I start telling to them about the policies and the
politics of, about it and the food systems, it's just going to
(36:55):
be like an argument. And sometimes it's difficult.
So I don't go into that when I'min with family.
So, but to kind of tell you whatFuture Food Institute is.
So it's a nonprofit organization.
So we work in the parallel of food systems, of course.
So we work on a lot of projects related to food system.
(37:17):
Mostly our focus is on regenerative practices, so
something called Future Lands ifyou you've already met
Alessandro. So Sarah Roversi and Andrea
Majelli are the founders and theCEO of this company.
And a lot of the things that I'mable to do now are thanks to
their kind of confidence in whatwho I am.
(37:37):
I mean, even if I don't really come from a food scientist
background, I'm kind of leading the Food Alchemist lab right
now. And we have this, you know, a
great team with, you know, with different backgrounds that kind
of help these projects. So it's very difficult to bring
(37:58):
into a nutshell the kind of projects we do.
We have projects on save the Ocean, we are working on the
Mediterranean diet, we're working on regenerative
agriculture. This is one of the main focuses
on one of our living labs here in Tuscany, in Bologna.
We work a lot on innovation, food innovation, food
innovation, but not in the tech perspective that how you are
having there, but more on food science and food science and
(38:21):
gastronomy. So we do work on new product
developments. So one of the focuses for the
Food Alchemist Lab is working oncreating new products for CPG
companies. OK.
Corporate companies, I mean in, in companies like Barilla and
Dole or Nestle, as you say, but it's not just that, it's also
kind of being an, a connection, a bridge for, for research, for
(38:45):
academics and the food industry.So what we have noticed or we
understood in the last 10 years that, you know, Future Food
Institute has existed in the work that we have continued to
do is that there is a huge gap in in all these companies that
are creating these new products right there.
The Nest Labor, they're all brick company, they're all doing
food. But there is the intention or
(39:06):
the purpose behind creating or innovating with food is is not
coming from research background or it's not coming from the need
perspective or coming from academic background.
It's just innovating for the sake of innovating, right?
Yeah. So here the think that future
food is that we have this methodology called prosperity
thing. So it's about not just creating
(39:27):
for the sake of creating for human beings, but also
understanding that the planet has boundaries and we've already
crossed a lot of those boundaries and keeping within
the planetary needs. So when you're creating.
So that's one reason why I'm really happy with the work that
I do here. We focus a lot on food waste.
So how can we, how can we or howmight we valorize the, all the
(39:51):
Agri food waste that's being generated?
So, you know, one of our goals is that one is through, of
course, regenerative kitchens and how how regenerative
kitchens is not just about going, you know, Fast forward
into innovation, learning from the past, you know, traditions
are also a part of us and it's kind of the innovation is just
(40:12):
evolution of it. So not really letting go of
culture, of heritage. These are all things that are
part of, you know, the food alchemist as well as in future
food as a whole, you know, as a it's an ecosystem.
Future food you cannot say is 1.You know, corporate company
doesn't function in a corporate model.
It's, it's a nonprofit organization, Yes, but it's more
(40:33):
about the people and networks that we have in different parts
of the world. Yeah, we are in Japan.
So in Japan we are focusing on regenerative cities.
As you know that almost by 2050 that 85% of the population is
going to be living in urban centers.
Yeah, rural areas are being abandoned.
(40:54):
So what is happening to the rural areas?
We have another living lab in Apalika, which is the southern
part of Italy. It is abandoned, was an
abandoned town and now we're regenerating the town through
through so many projects that we've been bringing.
We're connecting with the producers, the local farmers
there, the local fishermen there.
(41:14):
So Polika is right at the centerof the Mediterranean Sea.
So it's at. So you have the Mediterranean
Sea, you have the Spain, you have Turkey, you have all of
these countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea.
And Polika is one of the emblematic towns for the
community of UNESCO Mediterranean Diets.
So we're bringing back to Polikaall of those, all of that
(41:36):
knowledge that was lost, you know, so people are forgetting,
people are moving away. The town is just mainly now old
people. We need to learn from them.
I mean, we are losing that heritage.
So we're learning from these older generation the way of
fishing that doesn't harm the ocean, but helps, you know, the,
(41:57):
the, the fish and also has something to feed us and
continue to feed us for the nextgenerations.
You know, learning from these fishermen, learning from the
farmers how it should have been,you know, not going into that
industrial farming, industrial farming way, but that
regenerative can still feed people for the, the thing about
(42:18):
regenerative, it is circular, right?
It does. It's not a linear way of
functioning. You just don't take and take and
take and take in one day. It's over, but you continue for
or the next generation and the year after that.
So it's about educating and showing to the world that this
can this, this is the way it should function.
This can be, you know, scaled upor shown to, I mean, build taken
(42:42):
up from here in Polika and implemented in different parts
of the world. So one of our goals is to,
that's why when we started in Japan, we were bringing people
from Japan to see how people lived in Polika.
And, and they're still rooted inthose, in that, in that
heritage, in the way they eat, just the way we eat.
It's about how we live. So showing them how we live.
(43:02):
So this was how we started. And now it's the, the polycar
model is something that Amanasara's visions is to have
500 polycars, you know, existingaround the world.
So building regenerative cities is, is one part of that that
dream that she has. So it's, so these are some of
(43:22):
the ways I can say, but it's, it's difficult to, you know,
come bring it all down into summarizing and all the work.
Remember, I think you've done a good job.
I think for somebody. I think if somebody who doesn't
even have context can get because you've used like real
places and real examples of the kind of works you've done.
And that's super interesting forme also to listen that somebody
who comes from like hotel kitchens then into food
(43:43):
photography and styling is on this board of.
Because mostly what happens is these kind of platforms or these
kind of associations where you have these food policy making or
all the gastro diplomacy and things around it.
It is mostly full of people withiron, historians and
archaeologists and anthropologists and
sociologists. Yeah, which I think is very
important. But again, you can't miss out
the, the, the person who's worked closely with food or
(44:04):
somebody who has like lived experience with food.
So for me, that's very interesting.
And that's again, again, one of the purpose of the podcast to to
make people listen and hear thatit's people, people like you.
And there are many, many more out there who are working with
food and who want, who have these priorities or have these
ethics. And they want to, I want to
invite them to like, say right to institutions you want to work
with. And maybe this position doesn't
exist or maybe they are not looking for a chef as per SE,
(44:25):
But I've known people who've made place for themselves in
these institutions just by persisting and saying that, you
know what, I can contribute some.
And there's a cold methodology around it.
So it's, it's very inspiring to,to hear what you're saying,
Sandhya. And for you, for yourself, like
now after having so many pivots and also like starting into
pivots, like, say, food photography where you were happy
and felt like a good escape and then you got tired of it and
(44:46):
things like that, of knowing somebody who's creatively hungry
and gets and reaches the, the epitome of whatever you do,
what's next for you? Where do you see yourself?
What directions do you want to take after this?
At this moment, I think I'm, I still feel like I have a lot to
do. I mean, last week we were doing
the gastro diplomacy boot camp in Polika.
(45:07):
So we had people coming in from US, the Culinary Institute of
America. It's so interesting.
So we had six students coming infrom the Culinary Institute of
America. We had three indigenous people
coming in from Amazonia. So it was very interesting,
enriching, you know, each and every conversation you felt like
you didn't have enough. You need to more, you need to
have more of these conversations.
(45:28):
You wanna talk about this and you wanna talk about that
because you're having so many connections back home as well.
I don't know how much, but we had so much similarity with
Brazil. I mean, for me, Kerala, I was
connecting so much with Brazil because in terms of the
biodiversity, the way they eat, the culture.
And I was like, OK, we eat this as well.
(45:49):
We cook it this way. You know, we, we use this as an
ingredient and we use this spiceas well.
And it was so amazing the way that we could connect.
And for me, when I am in this kind of environments, I don't
feel like I've had enough. You know, I need more of time.
I want to be in the same mix and, you know, continue to have
these conversations and I want to continue doing this.
(46:10):
I want to continue being this connection that I have in just a
small part, right? I mean, came as a chef.
I mean, the only thing I have totalk about is food.
And that's all is needed to connect with all these people.
All you needed was food and you bring in politics, you bring in
colonization, you bring in trade, you bring in war, you
bring in climate change. Everything is connected to food.
(46:32):
So I think that is a powerful thing itself, what you do.
It's just that you'd, I think you need to be aware that food
has that much power and, you know, go don't be afraid to kind
of go behind those things. Maybe talking about politics
scares you a bit, but I think you need to talk about politics
(46:53):
when you talk about food. I think you need to talk about
colonization when you talk aboutfood.
And I think you need to talk about war when you talk about
food. I think you need to have those
difficult conversations. So and being chefs, we have that
power. That's the thing.
We have that power. We don't know that we have that
power. It's only when you're put in
these kind of environments that you realize it and you're like,
(47:15):
wow, I can talk to this person about colonization that happened
100 years ago, which is still happening.
It's so sad that it's still happening.
I just, I don't think I want to go away from this kind of a
space for at least at least for another few years for sure.
Yeah, no. It's definitely, it's very
interesting to see that you're in a position where, I mean, the
(47:36):
fact that you're not done with it is because it's so different
and so diverse and so many different challenges coming up
every day and the kind of job you do.
And I think it's a great position to be in where you can.
I mean, you have projects which are time bound, but you have
time to switch between them and change, kind of refresh yourself
into something, something interesting, you know, And just
to wrap this up, Sandy I. Mean ask you.
Yeah, it's, I mean, I can completely relate and it's
(47:57):
that's beautiful, I think because you get to like relearn,
re explore, also redefine your priorities, redefine what you,
what you believe in AM. I still thinking, yeah, exactly.
Food, and I'm still creating food.
I mean just that now my ingredients are, you know,
bacteria and fungi probably. Definitely.
That's food that that that is the evolution.
(48:17):
It's still food. I mean, I'm still cooking and
I'm still have these experiences.
Talk about this on the table. Talk about why we need to do
fermentation. You know, those it's, it's, it's
really beautiful how that for me, the journey has been how
I've evolved as a person, as a chef as well.
So yeah. Yeah.
I mean, I think also like the jobs like this have a very great
impact. I mean, very bigger impact,
(48:38):
which is the which is not seen, but it's it's lived.
So maybe I don't know, the people who work in industries
like this are not the biggest, most famous celebrities, but the
impact they have. I mean, the ones who are
celebrities in the chef world are the ones who are serving 50
diners a night. Whereas the ones who are who are
behind the scenes, the ones creating actual impact into,
into millions of lives and communities.
You know, which is, which is ironic.
(48:58):
And which is why also this platforms like this exist where
people can have a voice who don't have the voice and can't
reach the people they have to hear.
And then just the right, the right moment to ask you this
question, Sandhya, for somebody listening to you who's saying,
oh, this sounds interesting, This sounds amazing.
What Sandhya is doing. It's super relatable.
I find myself in, say, the Sandhya 10 years ago.
What would you say to this person?
Like what do they need to do or what kind of advices they need
(49:21):
to listen to be able to, to get where they want to get?
Not exactly where you are, but in their on in their on bubble
where they can get. Think one thing I would, you
know, say is that I never ask questions.
I mean, I was things were comingto me and I was just doing it so
but I'm never to stop asking questions.
No, I mean, I never asked where the food was coming from when I
(49:43):
was working in the hotel. I mean, I didn't, I didn't know
how to ask those questions. Probably I didn't know, you
know, there was a problem in thesupply chain.
I didn't know there was a problem in the food system.
So I think you need to ask me brave and bold enough to ask
those questions. And you know, maybe that
question is going to give you problem, give you a problem with
(50:03):
your chef or your your boss or your supervisor or whatever.
But I think you need to, you know, start asking those
questions. But I, I also feel like the, the
generation now, I mean, I mean, I'm having, I'm interacting a
lot with younger generation because I, it's one of the part
of my work is also education. So we also have interns coming
from Basque as well. You know, so you have students
(50:25):
who want to do an internship andthey already thinking in a
different way when they make thechoice to come and do an
internship with future Food Institute.
They already stepping away from I don't want to be in a Michelin
restaurant. I want to do something different
there itself. They've already made the choice.
So I don't think this generationneeds much of an advice.
I don't think they are afraid or, you know, they have the they
(50:47):
already have that in their mindset.
They want to be regenerated. They are not just, you know,
they're curious about fermentation, they are curious
about anthropology, they're curious about the food waste.
So it's already that that momentum has happened, which
which didn't happen for people coming in from my generation a
decade. We didn't discuss these things,
but now everybody's talking about it.
(51:09):
I mean, maybe it's social media,maybe it's the way things have
changed. Maybe it's that crisis is in
everybody's plate now. So that that that, you know,
that people are out there doing what they think is right.
So I don't feel like I have muchto, you know, kind of encourage
(51:31):
them. They're already in the right
direction. I just hope I can also inspire
and learn from them as well. You know, fun.
Sometimes you lose the courage and then these guys, these
younger generation gives you that, you know, to keep going
on. You're doing it.
So amazing. Somebody just coming and telling
to me, you know, who's just coming out of CIA and telling
me, oh, this is so cool what you're doing.
That's enough. You know, that's kind of my, my,
(51:53):
my field to go forward for the next 10 or 6 months or one year,
definitely. So it's very positive to hear.
I'm very much in agreement with what you say about the comments
you've made. And I mean, there's so much
negative happening in the world that it's it's positive.
See that there is these small circles where these things are
happening and, and the future does look promising.
I think this is just like these in the right place with the with
the right people in it. I feel it's the small impacts
(52:15):
will lead to a bigger, greater future, which we really need at
this moment. So thank you so much, Sandhya.
First of all, accepting this on such a short notice for giving
you time. I bet you inspire a lot of
people listening to this. And and yeah, I hope, I hope we
run into each other. I would love to.
I would love. To yes, if you are ever in
Bologna, please definitely come to the lab.
We'll show you around our cool little secret cave that we have
in the basement. Definitely looking forward to
(52:37):
that. But yeah, thank you so much,
Sandhya. See you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Take care.
So hello everyone and welcome back to Fugitive Chef's podcast.
Today we have Sandhya Kumar and Sandhya is actually a fellow
Indian, the first Indian actually on the podcast, which
is funny because I have approached some, but somehow it
happened to be that I didn't getanybody on board.
Also the first woman on the season and that's quite
unfortunate. I have to look for more female
profiles. I think there's a lot of there's
(00:20):
a big chunk of like women out there who are doing some great
work like Sandhya. Sandhya will tell us more about
what she does. But from what I know, Sandhya
works at the Future Food Institute, which also is a
coincidence because we work withclosely with Future Food and
many projects. I've worked with Alessandro and
people, other people from the institute on projects primarily
in Japan. We have a gastronomy innovation
campus in Tokyo and there we arelike we are working on the more
(00:41):
food tech side of things, whereas Future Food is on the
regenerative cities kind of things.
But yeah, I mean, Sandhya after all, is from what I saw from the
website, you're AR and D chef and A food designer.
And that's the whole part of thepodcast, right?
Because we have people who are into these, I would say, niche
kind of jobs or also roles that have been made for these kind of
profiles like us, right? But before we dig into all of
(01:02):
that, Sandhya, I would like to know how did you end up in food?
Like, what was it? When where did it start?
It's a very long journey. It started in 2018, so we're
going to go back in history like15 years back.
But just want to say thank you. Thank you so much for coming,
for having me here. And I'm going to be sending you
a list of all the women you should be doing.
(01:23):
Please, that would be amazing. Please please do that.
There's so many people out here doing so many cool stuff.
Really it's with the job that I have right now.
It's a great opportunity. The kind of people I get to meet
right now, it's so inspiring. It's every day you're learning
something from each and every person.
So it's it's really cool what people are doing out here right
(01:43):
now. So it's really interesting.
But yes, I started my journey back in India.
I did my culinary school, hoodlemanagement, actually three years
of hoodle management. I knew I wanted to be a chef
when I was 15. So I really, really focused on
getting myself into the institute, into the university.
(02:03):
And I really knew I wanted to work in in hotels and
restaurants. So towards the end of my final
year in the university, I was already with a job in hand.
I was going to go to The Four Seasons.
It was the first Four Seasons tocome into India.
So it was a luxury property. It's a very big brand.
So it was so exciting, you know,to start your, you know, first
(02:24):
career, first job in such a big brand.
It was kind of natural, right? You do the whole management, you
get into the hotel and you startworking there.
But I'm going to interrupt you there over Sunday because I
mean, I think this is very interesting for me because I
have like clarified this a lot of times when because I was from
a Chimbabwe, I started hotel management.
And that was because I think it's only in India, but there
(02:45):
are cities, for example, I was last like now at work, I'm very
often in Tokyo. And they're also like, I was
talking to restaurant entrepreneurs and they were
like, yeah, I have a restaurant in this 50 story building.
Whereas in Europe that's the shittiest restaurant you can go
to if it's in a massive building.
And at the same time, in India, all the good restaurants are in
hotels, right? Which is I think I understand,
because that's the kind of clientele, that's the kind of
clientele who would afford that meal is living there.
(03:06):
So it's. Funny for me because we.
We. Look up to these hotel
restaurants which I think do great jobs, but over here you
never look. I mean, there are very few
exceptions in. Spain, for example.
Yeah, you don't look at the reference of like the standalone
restaurants are a thing which ishappening in India also now.
But I just want to clarify this,that it's, it's funny.
True way true. I mean, we both now in India
that you see, it's this, it's been the last maybe 3 or 4 years
(03:29):
that you see standalone restaurants are coming up or
popping up and having the same, you know, talking point or
stability that you see with the five star hotel.
So getting into a five star or abig chain group meant that, OK,
you have job security, you have,you know, a good starting point.
So that was that was establishedlike that, you know, 15 years
ago. Oh yes.
(03:50):
So it was very obvious for me toget into one of those.
It was either Four Seasons or itwas going to the Oberois or Taj,
you know, one of those large that was the picture that was
given. You know, you never knew about
Michelin restaurants. You never knew about stand
alone. It didn't kind of exist that
kind of culture, the Nexus. So and also staying with the
company for a long time, right? So if you stay 10 years in the
(04:12):
company, they show that, OK, you've been loyal.
So you kind of stick to it and you don't kind of change jobs
and jump from 2 restaurants to the other one.
But you see now it's, it's not something that was very common
back then. So yes, I started in 2008 with
The Four Seasons and I worked inthat company till 2014.
So 8 years I spend with, with the company.
(04:33):
But the interest interesting part of me is I was already kind
of stepping out of the kitchen when I was working in Four
Seasons. So I was very passionate about
photography. So I started doing, I went to
study photography since I was passionate about it.
I was like, OK, let me just takeit as a hobby or study
something. So I went to National Institute
(04:53):
of Bombay, National Institute ofPhotography in Bombay and then
I, I was doing night shifts so that I could go to classes
during the day. So this is how it's kind of so
in a way it is flexible. The hotel, I mean, my chefs are
very flexible. OK, you want to study?
OK, you go do you can, we can do.
So 3-4 months. I was continuously doing night
shift. I was only saying, yeah, this is
(05:16):
how I did. And I started photography.
It was more of just to learn howto, you know, get the pictures.
So it was never about food or anything that perspective.
And one of the professors in my photography class were like, so
you're a chef, you must be doingfood styling.
And I'm like, you mean food plating?
And I said, yes, I do food plating.
It's something that is very normal for us in the restaurant.
(05:37):
No, no, no, I meant food styling.
And I was like, I don't know what you're talking about.
So he said he then he showed me these profiles of really cool
food stylist and they were like,you know, they do this for, you
know, brands for commercial brand photography.
And I was like, OK, I mean, it'slooks easy to do.
I mean, doesn't look so comfortable complicated.
And they were like, OK, would you mind doing some of the, you
(05:59):
know, sessions for us? I was like, OK, And they said
they'll pay me. I said OK, you know, you will
get an extra income. I don't mind.
Yeah. So I went ahead and did some
styling for the brand photography classes that they
were having on the site. So I was, you know, working on
setting up the tables, plating the food in a way.
And I was working still with food.
(06:19):
OK, Nothing artificial yet. So then they also taught me in
in a way that you don't really use food for food photography,
you use other things. And then I kind of started
exploring that area. So instead of milk, you were
using white glue to let this, for example, it was a cereal
shooter, Kellogg's cereal photo and you want them to float on
(06:42):
top, right? And if you put it in milk, it
basically sinks. So I was like, OK, so I was
learning tricks like that from them.
And then I was like, OK, you know, went back to the hotel and
I was like, you know, I'm doing this.
And this is something that we could also do for the magazines
of the hotel and we could reallymake the you know, so we have in
house photographers, we have in house sales and marketing team
(07:03):
pushing me to all of their big hotels.
So they already have a banned portfolio you have to follow.
So I was starting to input and help, you know, things like that
in, in the hotel. And then at one point I, I
stopped being in the kitchen because of a personal issue
with, with one of the chefs. So he's from New Zealand.
He was a bit racist with me. And I was like, I cannot, I was
(07:26):
ready to quit the company. This is one of the reasons why I
really still love being in touchwith the people of The Four
Seasons. So they had such, I don't know
how do you say such clarity about the issue and they knew
how to handle it because there was no evidence of how he was
being, you know, manipulative or, you know, being targeting me
through the this kind of racistic comments.
(07:48):
They removed me from working under him.
So they gave me another positionin the hotel where I could work
as I was working with the food and beverage director, I was
working with the general manager, I was working with this
photographer already. So I was already doing a bit of
being the bridge between the kitchen and the to the
departments where it kind of a position that never existed.
So they created the space for mewhere I could still do be in
(08:11):
touch with food, but be the right connection, you know,
between these all departments. So and it's very important also
where you need to interact with the exhibition chef and tell
them chef, I need these kind of,you know, images and things that
need to go out or I need to connect with the, you know, the
suppliers for this purpose and things like that.
So I was becoming sort of a chefwho knew all the things that how
it functions inside, but being the kind of connecting point for
(08:35):
all these other departments. So in this is I, this is how I
started kind of stepping out of the kitchen, you know,
traditional kitchen format. And but I never stopped being a
cook, I think, and I never stopped being a cooking food or
not being in the kitchen. But and then due to other
personal reasons, I quit Four Seasons, not, not because I
didn't want to be with the company.
(08:55):
I moved back home. I moved back to Kerala where I'm
from in the South of India. So I moved to my home city and I
took kind of a break and then I,I was kind of lost.
I, I was doing something that I really enjoyed.
I really loved being in that space.
And suddenly I was away from allof those things that gave me
comfort and happiness. And it was very difficult
(09:15):
finding your footing. You know, when you are, it's
home, but still you don't feel like you're sitting in that
perspective. So I started doing very small
ways. I started doing classes,
workshops. I was doing small events,
private events for other people.And then I started in that small
(09:36):
way. I started a company of my own.
OK. So food styling was also there,
a bit of it, you know, doing some food styling work for
people. And then I get a call from
someone, some random person saying that, you know, we doing
a movie and we want you to be doing the food.
And I was like, yeah, yeah, I knew it was.
(09:57):
I really thought it was a joke calling from this production
company, blah blah blah. And I was like, okay, somebody
from Bombay, one of my old friends is cracking me up and
okay, yeah, thank you, yeah, okay, okay, cool, okay, yeah, I
get the same call and it's like,okay, this sounds a bit serious
now. And I'm like, okay, so you want,
they wanted a meeting and I was like, okay.
And then it was they were going to do the remake of the
(10:21):
Hollywood movie, John Flower's the food truck movie.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So they the, the apparently this
director got the rights to remake it in the Bollywood
version. So I was like, they wanted me to
be part of the food styling. Somebody had recommended me from
somebody who was in Four Seasonsand knew about the work that I
was doing, kind of recommended me.
And I was like, it was one of the big work that I did.
(10:44):
And through this whole movie, I was, you know, travelling with
the whole crew, six months on shoot locations.
I was working with Saif Ali Khanand Padma Priya, really two
major, you know, Bollywood actors at the time.
I was like a completely different experience.
No, you're yeah, I'm cooking sometimes behind, you know, sets
(11:06):
in a back of the sets with like portable kitchens and doing
food. And.
And the thing was almost all of the food in that movie was real.
And because the director was like, no, I don't want any fake
stuff that you do for or, you know, those brand photography
for food glue make food like really good.
I want them to really enjoy and eat.
And I want those expressions to come out.
(11:26):
So OK, no pressure at all. You need to make food look good
and taste good on camera and forpeople to eat.
So that was really enjoyable. And it was something that I
really love doing just out of mycomfort zone completely.
Yeah. No kitchen to cook in, no faking
stuff. So it was, it was something very
interesting for me. That's super funny.
(11:46):
Like you've had a a lot of pivots, right.
You've had like so many pivots through like through your hotel
jobs and I mean. For me it's very.
Interesting. Yeah, no, it just happens to be
and I mean for me that's the interesting point that I think
there is there's something natural in like something you do
with food that there are opportunities to pivot and it's
just the right people who know when is the right time to do it.
But for me it's interesting. I would like to like a little go
(12:07):
back to hotels as such, because the reason I was, for example, I
was never a big fan of hotels because I was in, in Grand Hyatt
when I was doing my, the industrial traineeship in the
second year. And then I had, yeah.
And then there's the typical management training programs,
you know, so I had, I had one with the Park Hotel, I had with
the Taj. And then there were CLD and all
these things. And for me, what happened is
very early on, especially when Iwas in, in IHM, I started
(12:30):
working with Alex Sanchez at thetable with together with
together with College in the evenings.
And that's where I got a touch of the things that I felt what
he was doing, the exposure he had, for example, being in a
stand alone was very different from what I felt hotels were
looking me for. Like for me in the interviews or
in what was explained to me about hotels, I felt like they
have people who can cook, they have people who can run their
operations every day. They need somebody who knows how
(12:51):
to use a computer. They don't need somebody who can
make duty rosters, who can make.At least that was my perception
of how hotel restaurants in India work.
And that is a very unfair perception because I've not been
in them working on payroll. So for me, I want to know that
part because for me, that's whatdrove me to say, you know what,
I'd rather go to somewhere whereI'm actually being a cook and
not being also seen because a lot of these hotels, what I felt
(13:12):
is these cooks who have not gonethrough formal education have a
very negative perception towardspeople who are coming from hotel
management schools and entering these kitchens.
So it's a very, the politics is very high, the energy is not the
best position to be in. So for me, it felt like a very
big picture and I'll be a small puzzle in the big picture and I
would rather be something big insomething really small.
So how was that experience for you of working in hotels?
So that was the interesting thing about 4C, wherein I think
(13:35):
the level of the chefs in the kitchen were a bit different.
So there was, you know, yes, there were a few people who were
coming from, OK, not official training or they were just cooks
who just had experience and their food was, you know, the
talking. But there are also people who
are coming from, you know, schools like us as well.
(13:56):
And then that was the interesting part about Four
Seasons was like they didn't want to know whether you knew
how to do an omelette or they didn't ask you whether you knew
how to do the, you know, the mayonnaise and the hollandaise.
They didn't ask you, you come, you learn the way we do it.
And you know, so they put you through the training processes.
They had a really cool, you know, onboarding process where
(14:19):
in the six months, sorry, for meit was 18 months because I did
the onboarding for 18 months where you go through every phase
of the kitchen, every departmentin the kitchen.
And it kind of gave me a good foundation.
So I also did my training internship before with the
Auberoi. So I knew I saw the difference.
I saw how different the way you were taught was.
(14:39):
And of course the politics is there.
Being a girl is not easy. You were like one girl in that
one whole kitchen. There was another girl in the
Japanese kitchen and there was another girl in the Chinese
kitchen. Indian kitchen, no girls.
Pastry, Yes, you will find more girls in pastry, but this was so
if you talk more to a person, there is always like, oh, she's
always talking to this, you know, the there was always these
(15:01):
kind of frictions that you'd kind of learn to navigate
around. And I think one being a girl and
one being like very young in theindustry, you find your ways to
deal with these kind of situations and stuff.
But luckily I was in a very goodcompany with Four Seasons, so I
didn't really suffer a lot of those negative, you know,
(15:24):
things. There was there.
There were definitely one, but not too much.
Like for me, the worst was beingyou know, losing my integrity
was something that I wouldn't want to sacrifice on.
So that's where I stopped. I said I will quit because I
can't work with this person withthis the chef, the the person
was very I was picking and it picking on me for every single
(15:45):
thing said I I will not lose my integrity there.
So that's when I decided I'm leaving the company.
It's OK. I had a good, it was already
around 6-6 years by then with the company and that's, I think
they also saw how I was in the past year.
So they believed in what I was as a person.
So they gave me that opportunity.
OK, don't leave. Let's put you away from this
(16:07):
whole situation. And, you know, they gave me that
position of, you know, being a coordinator, being the food
styling, doing all of those things that I still love to do,
you know, take, you know, they gave that opportunity to me.
And unfortunately, the guy who was targeting me lost his job in
the next 6 months. So I was like, can I go back to
the kitchen now, please? Yeah.
He listen to this. He was for another exactly for
(16:29):
another issue where he was harassing another employee.
He was quite, I mean, there was proof.
And then it was he was sad. Yeah.
So in a way, I felt like I was not in a very toxic environment
all throughout. So I had seniors or supervisors
about me who I could approach and say, see, this is not
working for me or I need to stepaway from this kind of
(16:50):
situation. I mean, we were still putting in
14 hours, 15 hours long shifts, early mornings, night shifts,
all of that was still there. But that is something that we
are we, I know I kind of felt just part of the job, right?
I mean, you are told that you don't have 8 hour shifts when
you work in a hotel. It's something that comes as a
disclaimer to your, you know, contract.
(17:11):
I feel those were not something that I felt was an issue.
And I was young, I had the energy, I could work.
I mean, I didn't mind and I feltlike maybe if I stayed that one
hour extra, maybe the chef will show me how to really do the do
the pizza dough or the, you know, the bread and this this
recipe, a special sauce or something like that.
So you didn't mind for the learning sake of it, you would
(17:32):
give up that one hour where you just go back home no problem.
No, totally. I think your experience is super
enriching. I think it's it's very unique in
itself because I mean it's very subjective.
I think all experiences are subjective.
And I think there's a lot of pros of working in hotels.
Also, it's a very organized thatsomebody take care of you.
You have your uniforms iron whenyou walk in.
There's a lot of benefits of andI think especially in a country
like India, I feel a lot of people who I speak to now,
(17:53):
friends from back during collegedays, I speak to them.
And I think what also I think leads to people tending to go to
hotels because at least in Europe, where I'm right now,
there is a basic health care structure, there's a pension
plan, there's a government that cares for you, what has the
resources to care for you. I don't think, I don't think
Indian government doesn't want to.
It's just I think it's too, too big a population to manage with
too very little taxpayers. So I feel in that sense, hotels
(18:15):
provide this kind of a Plan B orsomething outside the system
that helps. So I think, yeah, that's also,
you know, everybody has their own context to, to, to build
what they find their preference to be.
But for you, Sandhya, for example, because I mean, in
India, it's, it's not like food designing is new, you know,
because I remember when I was inschool, a family friend, a
cousin of mine is very good friends with Michael Swami.
And I had a chat with him and he's like a very established
(18:37):
food designer, photographer and things like that.
So did you, did you plan to likeafter experience with being in a
movie with Seth and things like that?
Did you think of, I don't know, building a brand for yourself or
specializing that or making a brand for yourself, you know,
being an entrepreneur in that sense, or why did that lead you
to? To be honest, everything
happened too fast for me. Everything happened after the
movie. Everything was happening very
(18:57):
fast already. I was working as a consultant
for restaurants, so I was helping with, you know, other
entrepreneurs setting up restaurants in different parts
of the city or different parts of the state.
So I was travelling already for a lot of things.
When on the movie thing came into the picture, I was, luckily
I didn't have any commitment projects in, in one location.
So I was travelling with the crew six months I was on the
(19:19):
road. So coming back, I think I, it
was like, OK, you know, you are on newspapers, you are on
articles. It's, it's like you have an
explosion. People are just, they want to
work with you. So I was having a lot of TV
commercials, doing TV commercials, photography.
So it was work after work and then consultancy also.
That's when I did one big project for BMW Mini Cooper.
(19:41):
We set up the restaurant. They wanted to get into urban
lifestyle. I mean, they have the car
showrooms and they want to plug in a cafe and a lifestyle part
of it into it. And I designed the whole cafe
for them. So all of this was just
happening one after the other where you didn't have the time
to kind of reflect this. Is this what I want to do?
I mean, is this the direction I want to go?
(20:01):
I mean. I've been doing so many things.
There was no moment to reflect. So there's no moment to ask
yourself, no moment to kind of evaluate or build a brand or you
know, I had the Instagram profile and I just kept sharing,
you know, making reels or photosand that was it.
That was the only kind of marketing or something that I
did because before I finish one project, I'm jumping to another
(20:22):
one parallely. So it was like that.
The moment I stopped was during pandemic, so 2020, like
everybody was told to sit at home.
So I was like in a way happy, sorry to say this, but I was so
happy that I didn't have to, youknow, run out of house and, you
know, drive another 4 hours to the next client.
So it was good for one month because then I again getting
(20:45):
calls from my client. What do we do with the
restaurant? What do we do with this?
We are losing money. We're doing that.
I'm like, OK, so you know, it, it, it was like going back into
that loop again. So it was like, OK, let's now
switch to cloud kitchen model. Let's now do the delivery
system. How good can we do the
deliveries? How can we make it different?
You know, it was exhausting. So it was, I knew at that time,
(21:06):
OK, I don't want to do this for the next 10 years.
I didn't want to continue like this.
I didn't find any happiness in going to this set, you know, and
these sets, working in sets are like worse than working in
restaurants. You start at 6:00 in the
morning, early in the morning, and sometimes the last shot is
finishing at one or two in the night.
(21:27):
So you are there the whole day. Next day, you have no energy to
get up. So it was even more exhausting
than working in restaurants. But it's just one day probably.
So you don't do it every day. And yes, it does come with a
good amount of money. I'm not disagreeing on that.
But still, I didn't want to continue doing that for the rest
of my life. It didn't feel any, you know, I
(21:49):
didn't feel any. This wasn't my goal.
It it didn't feel like this is something that I want to
continue doing. So that's when I started looking
for food design, you know, so I wanted to study something and I
didn't know what I wanted to study, to be honest.
Food design, food styling. OK, maybe I thought, OK, I can
make my art better. Maybe I can, you know, know,
learn how to be better at building a brand image, you
(22:11):
know, things, things like that. OK, I'll Start learning that.
That's when I kind of stumbled upon the food design innovation
here with the Scholar Polytechnica in Milan.
So I came across that. I actually came across that
couple of years ago, but it was not, you know, in full decision
that that I was like, what the time to go and study.
I have so many projects, I have so many clients.
(22:32):
So I went back to that during the pandemic time and I was
like, OK, maybe this is the time, you know, I can take a
break for for a year, do this masters then come back and you
know, it'll have some values that I can probably incorporate
another company that I'm trying to build or something.
So this was my intention when I moved to Italy 3 1/2 years ago.
(22:53):
When I came here, I was like, OK, something new, open.
I was 31 when I came here, so I was like nobody my age is gonna
be there, It's OK. It was a bit of a bit strange
situation where I am sitting with 20 year olds, 19 year olds,
you know, and they are already coming from design backgrounds
and talking about this. I mean, it was a bit surreal for
(23:15):
me to be in that kind of an environment after 1015 years,
for 12-13 years, he left university 2008, and now he is
suddenly sitting in the same environment.
It was a bit surreal for me at that time, yeah.
I mean, what happened for me during the course was that I
learned that I'm doing all of the things that they're talking
(23:36):
about, you know, so they were talking about local food.
They were talking about, you know, community and, you know,
sustainability. I didn't use these words.
I didn't know how to use these words probably, but I was
already doing that. So there's this project that I
was working on back home before the pandemic.
It was with the school. It was it belonged to a friend
(23:57):
of mine and it was a private school, but he was like,
Sandhya, I want you to come and teach them about food.
So I was like, OK, so the idea was to kind of set up a canteen
where they start eating, you know, early healthy food already
the campus was on a 0 waste to 0plastic.
They had already those kind of ideologies.
So just kind of easing into it. And there was, so I went to each
(24:20):
and every classroom and I spoke to them about eating local
nutritionals, meal healthy meals, balancing your, balancing
your food, why you need to eat your, you know, jackfruit, mango
and bananas and your beans. And, and it was very simple
coming from my personal knowledge.
I didn't study about the sustainability.
I didn't, I didn't study about the SDG goals that we are so
(24:42):
focused right now on. And the time the intention was
feed good food, the kids healthyfood.
You know, that was the only goal.
And then we, I went into teaching women who are working
in the school. We have the system in your
schools, right Aya, who is always with the kids in the
classrooms with the lunch box and helping with the kids.
So from younger classrooms basically.
(25:04):
I mean you are in five, 5th, 5thclass and 4th class and stuff.
And these ladies were all from the local community.
So I taught them to make kimchi,I taught them to make hummus,
you know, making balanced nutritional meals every day for
lunch. So we set up a canteen where we
removed all those fried food, the, the cutlets in the, and the
(25:26):
snacks that you have from bakery.
All of that was omitted, completely removed.
And this is the, this is the meat you will have every day.
And the, the ladies, the chichi's were making the food
every day and they had these plates.
So not to focus on plastic. We had the steel plates that can
be reused, you know, all these kind of, and there was a farm in
(25:46):
the school as well. So there were vegetables like
tapioca that were, you know, taken from the farm that the
students did farming there. So they were, you know, taught
all of these things. And at that time I had no, you
know, official learning on SDG goals or sustainability.
And I was doing these things basically when I came to Milan
(26:07):
and I was doing all all these professors then coming to talk
to you about agro economy and, you know, the sustainable
agriculture and this and that. And I was like, OK, these are
things that I've been doing there.
But now I kind of got a kind of a structure to it.
I kind of got defined, like I got definitions for all the
things that I was doing. So I was like, OK, maybe this is
(26:27):
something that I can take back. You know, this is so the goal
was always go back to India, continue what I was doing.
But now I have all these words. That you know.
Theologies that I can. Yeah, yeah.
New tools to kind of tell the way I am.
The storytelling can kind of change, right.
So the way he was talking about it.
So. But then I had to do the
internship as well with the masters.
So when I was looking for the internship is when I saw Future
(26:51):
Food Institute. But because one of the directors
was also a professor there, so she was teaching us food design,
of course. And then I was like, OK, because
I didn't want to go back to a restaurant.
I mean, they were offering a restaurant, you know, because
you're a chef, maybe you can of course do your internship in a
restaurant. And I was like, yeah, you still
come from that mentality. No, I don't want to work in a
(27:11):
standard owned restaurant. Yeah.
And I didn't want to do that again in Italy because I already
know how a kitchen functions, how it should work, what are the
problems? I understand those things.
So I didn't, I think I didn't. I felt like I didn't have
anything to learn from there. So I decided I'll go with the
Future Food Institute. I mean, when I did the
(27:33):
interview, it was with one of the bus culinary school products
as well. So he was the manager of the
food alchemist lab that I'm leading now.
So he was the manager food scientist.
So coming from the gastronomy scientist background, Spanish.
I remember the name of this guy.He was the Masters.
Of no, it's Paco French. Paco, Paco, Paco.
Paco, Paco, Paco. So Paco a real scientist.
(27:56):
So I see him first time in a in a lab court and I was like, Oh
my God, this is not what I should be doing.
This is not where I should be looking for an internship.
And he was talking to me about Aspergillus, orizi and
rhizosporus. And I was like, can't even
pronounce those things. So he told me to go back to kind
of research. So never done research in my
(28:16):
life. I mean, in terms of scientific
research, never done scientific research in my career.
So I went back and, you know, itwas completely new.
Everything that I explored, learnt was completely new for
me. And he was like, this is what I
want. I don't want you to come with a
science background. I don't want you to tell me
(28:36):
which bacteria, which fungi, nothing.
I want what you have. So it's like, OK, so it felt a
bit more easy to getting into the job there.
Yeah. So I did my internship.
I learned everything about fermentation that I right now do
from there, from the Future FoodInstitute, from Francis
Francisco, I mean, from Paco forabout commentation about
handling bacteria and working with fungi and Koji and me.
(28:58):
So everything that I know right now is coming here and learning.
So for me, the journey, I don't think I took those, OK, this is
what I want to do. It just came to me in a way and
I just went with it. And I, I, it was my instinct.
I think, OK, I want to do this and I don't want to do this.
This doesn't feel right. This is what I feel I think I
can do. I will try it.
So it was kind of carving my ownway or path towards things and
(29:23):
it, it, it kind of fit And I, ifI felt comfort, if I felt like
I'm doing good, I kind of stuck around.
And I think that's what I've done.
I've been here for the last three years, 3 1/2, four years
now. And now I'm this place where I'm
leading the food alchemist lab and I'm working with scientists
and I'm working with anthropologists, I'm working
with, you know, indigenous people.
I'm working with so many different backgrounds and it's
(29:46):
only been enriching every, everystep, you know, So I don't
really have any kind of this thing that the hotel industry
didn't do me good, but it gave me all the right foundation or
the right things that I needed to be here right now, I feel.
Because yeah, yeah. And for you, I mean, what do you
recommend? Because I think it's super
interesting because there are people who are like interested
(30:07):
in food design, you know, like we have a master's over here now
which, which we have seen like students from, there's always
curiosity about like how food design works.
But I would love to know like your experience, how the course
was and how much of design like because you have faced that
first hand, you know, like how much design do you need to know
to get into a course of of that sort?
Do you recommend that as somebody who's say in your
position before doing that Masters?
(30:27):
The thing is, I felt like a lot of people had.
I mean, my personal thing was for me, it was good because I
was doing things without knowingwhat I was doing, right.
So I didn't have that structure.I didn't have that storytelling
knowledge. I didn't have.
This is the way you communicate about sustainability.
This is what sustainability is about.
I didn't have this, these tools that you have right now and it
(30:51):
kind of empowered me to be honest, from a chef to how going
through this masters gave me theright language to advocate what
I really wanted to communicate. I think it helped me, but I'm
sure some people felt like it was redundant because they came
from design schools. You basically went through
(31:12):
design thinking methodology. The thing is, design thinking
methodology for me is something that everybody does in a, in a,
in a natural way. We always explore our then we
come down to, OK, this is what you know, you narrow it down,
you converge. So design thinking is something
that we all everybody naturally is doing, but it's something
(31:33):
that you never taught. Like this is what design
thinking is or this is what thisthis methodology is.
So it gave me structure in a lotof ways the the course, the
masters. So I would still recommend, but
if it's only big only if you arelooking for something outside of
that traditional kitchen. I mean, there are people still
love going into Michelin restaurants and working for
(31:55):
large companies or there's stillpeople who love doing that.
So for them, I don't think, I don't know if it is valuable,
but yes, for people who are looking for something more than
just being in a kitchen, being just a chef and the person who
gives you all these options, OK,I want to work on food culture.
I want to work on food identity.I want to work when I know with
(32:18):
experiences, I want to work in, you know, connect people through
education. So you understand there are
there's so many parallels. You can still work with food,
but in different ways. So I think that kind of opens up
when you do this kind of a master.
So definitely, I know BCC started this year, right?
I mean this last year with the master's program.
Yeah, with Elsa. Elsa is a food designer.
(32:40):
She's she's leading this programof, of food design.
Yeah. I think it's a very different
view on food design, very much based.
I think it's not, I would say it's not so much about
connecting cultures and anthropology.
It's more about yeah, I think it's more about experience
based. So like we are doing projects
which are like we made a clinic for sugar detox.
So how sugar can be can be lowered just by sensory science.
So it's a lot of combination I would say not just food design,
(33:01):
but sensory science and how you play with colours and textures
and things like that to kind of change behaviour.
But it's super interesting for me this new and it's it's
correctly what you said. I think chefs do bring a
different skill of set of skills, which maybe are not very
documented and they're very learned.
They're very subjective also. But that's the whole part of the
podcast. Because I feel like a lot of
people, like a lot of people whowrite through the podcast or who
(33:21):
I speak to, who find themselves in this position where they feel
like they are somehow they they could contribute more.
But the current structure, be ita hotel or restaurant, is not
giving that kind of outlet. I feel they undervalue a lot of
skills they already have. Like, for example, like people
who said you, they offered the role for doing the production
with the movie or say doing those brand deals.
(33:42):
I think these people saw something in you which
subconsciously we ourselves don't see it because we've
normalized so much of like just knowing what food goes with what
or what color goes with what, what texture would, how acidity
would would kind of balance it out.
You know, I think these are skills which are not documented
because they come from experience.
They don't come from the school either.
But that's why I asked you this question because I think people
hearing should know that. I mean, the idea of the podcast
(34:04):
also is that people who listen to your story feel more
relatable. OK, Because I think if somebody,
if I myself go on the website offuture food, see you over there,
I was like, I'll be like, OK, maybe I can't as somebody who's
coming out of school, that meansI have to do like 10,000 masters
or a PhD to enter up in a Research Institute, you know, so
it's about showing these these possibilities.
So yeah, it's very enriching to hear this.
(34:24):
And next I would like to hear from you what is Future Food
Institute for people who don't know it?
And what's your everyday work like today?
It's a big, it's a big question,I mean.
Yes, it is, actually. It's one of the most difficult
questions to answer, to be honest.
Yeah. So your parents know what you
do? Because for me, that's a
(34:44):
interesting question because my parents, I think, don't
completely know what I do. I've tried explaining them what
I do, but they'd always say, OK,yeah.
But you were last week in Egypt teaching kids how to eat, and
now you're in Japan consulting Apackaging company on how they
should create a packaging for crisps.
So I think, yeah, for me, how would you explain, say, somebody
who doesn't know anything about food that's more interesting?
(35:04):
Like dumb it down the most you can.
Oh wow. So I struggle the most to
explain my job to people who don't come from the food
industry in general. You know, So my boyfriend is a
software engineer. So if I'm meeting his friends, I
just say I'm a chef. I'm stop there because if I say
food designer, they don't understand food design.
(35:26):
You design plates or you design something and it's like, it's
very exhausting. And the conversation just goes
into so many things because I have to tell them the whole
history of what is food designer, why food designer, why
I'm a chef and A food designer. I just don't go there.
Sometimes I just say I'm a chef,but I work for this company,
nonprofit organization, and they're like, okay, so they're
(35:51):
understanding. That's okay with my parents.
It's so funny because my parentsnever really know what I'm
doing. Yeah, they know I'm doing a lot
of things because even from likewhen I was doing the food
styling, when I was doing the movie, they're like, OK, I'm
doing the restaurant, then I'm doing the styling and today I'm
in shoot. So don't call me.
I can't pick up the phone. So they are, they kind of know
(36:12):
to let me be. They know I'm I'm doing things
that I really like and they knowI'm happy and they just let me
be there. They know I'm working for this
company called Future Food Institute.
She's teaching, she's cooking, she's fermenting.
They understand fermentation. My mom really curious about
kombucha and she, she's done kombucha when she was a very
young girl. So she was like, I know this.
(36:32):
And there is this, you know, skin that forms on top.
I played with it. And so I was like, so there are
a lot of the, you know, connections that I do have with
them in that terms of way. But really the core of, you
know, my, what I'm trying to advocate, probably not so much
because if I start telling to them about the policies and the
politics of, about it and the food systems, it's just going to
(36:55):
be like an argument. And sometimes it's difficult.
So I don't go into that when I'min with family.
So, but to kind of tell you whatFuture Food Institute is.
So it's a nonprofit organization.
So we work in the parallel of food systems, of course.
So we work on a lot of projects related to food system.
(37:17):
Mostly our focus is on regenerative practices, so
something called Future Lands ifyou you've already met
Alessandro. So Sarah Roversi and Andrea
Majelli are the founders and theCEO of this company.
And a lot of the things that I'mable to do now are thanks to
their kind of confidence in whatwho I am.
(37:37):
I mean, even if I don't really come from a food scientist
background, I'm kind of leading the Food Alchemist lab right
now. And we have this, you know, a
great team with, you know, with different backgrounds that kind
of help these projects. So it's very difficult to bring
(37:58):
into a nutshell the kind of projects we do.
We have projects on save the Ocean, we are working on the
Mediterranean diet, we're working on regenerative
agriculture. This is one of the main focuses
on one of our living labs here in Tuscany, in Bologna.
We work a lot on innovation, food innovation, food
innovation, but not in the tech perspective that how you are
having there, but more on food science and food science and
(38:21):
gastronomy. So we do work on new product
developments. So one of the focuses for the
Food Alchemist Lab is working oncreating new products for CPG
companies. OK.
Corporate companies, I mean in, in companies like Barilla and
Dole or Nestle, as you say, but it's not just that, it's also
kind of being an, a connection, a bridge for, for research, for
(38:45):
academics and the food industry.So what we have noticed or we
understood in the last 10 years that, you know, Future Food
Institute has existed in the work that we have continued to
do is that there is a huge gap in in all these companies that
are creating these new products right there.
The Nest Labor, they're all brick company, they're all doing
food. But there is the intention or
(39:06):
the purpose behind creating or innovating with food is is not
coming from research background or it's not coming from the need
perspective or coming from academic background.
It's just innovating for the sake of innovating, right?
Yeah. So here the think that future
food is that we have this methodology called prosperity
thing. So it's about not just creating
(39:27):
for the sake of creating for human beings, but also
understanding that the planet has boundaries and we've already
crossed a lot of those boundaries and keeping within
the planetary needs. So when you're creating.
So that's one reason why I'm really happy with the work that
I do here. We focus a lot on food waste.
So how can we, how can we or howmight we valorize the, all the
(39:51):
Agri food waste that's being generated?
So, you know, one of our goals is that one is through, of
course, regenerative kitchens and how how regenerative
kitchens is not just about going, you know, Fast forward
into innovation, learning from the past, you know, traditions
are also a part of us and it's kind of the innovation is just
(40:12):
evolution of it. So not really letting go of
culture, of heritage. These are all things that are
part of, you know, the food alchemist as well as in future
food as a whole, you know, as a it's an ecosystem.
Future food you cannot say is 1.You know, corporate company
doesn't function in a corporate model.
It's, it's a nonprofit organization, Yes, but it's more
(40:33):
about the people and networks that we have in different parts
of the world. Yeah, we are in Japan.
So in Japan we are focusing on regenerative cities.
As you know that almost by 2050 that 85% of the population is
going to be living in urban centers.
Yeah, rural areas are being abandoned.
(40:54):
So what is happening to the rural areas?
We have another living lab in Apalika, which is the southern
part of Italy. It is abandoned, was an
abandoned town and now we're regenerating the town through
through so many projects that we've been bringing.
We're connecting with the producers, the local farmers
there, the local fishermen there.
(41:14):
So Polika is right at the centerof the Mediterranean Sea.
So it's at. So you have the Mediterranean
Sea, you have the Spain, you have Turkey, you have all of
these countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea.
And Polika is one of the emblematic towns for the
community of UNESCO Mediterranean Diets.
So we're bringing back to Polikaall of those, all of that
(41:36):
knowledge that was lost, you know, so people are forgetting,
people are moving away. The town is just mainly now old
people. We need to learn from them.
I mean, we are losing that heritage.
So we're learning from these older generation the way of
fishing that doesn't harm the ocean, but helps, you know, the,
(41:57):
the, the fish and also has something to feed us and
continue to feed us for the nextgenerations.
You know, learning from these fishermen, learning from the
farmers how it should have been,you know, not going into that
industrial farming, industrial farming way, but that
regenerative can still feed people for the, the thing about
(42:18):
regenerative, it is circular, right?
It does. It's not a linear way of
functioning. You just don't take and take and
take and take in one day. It's over, but you continue for
or the next generation and the year after that.
So it's about educating and showing to the world that this
can this, this is the way it should function.
This can be, you know, scaled upor shown to, I mean, build taken
(42:42):
up from here in Polika and implemented in different parts
of the world. So one of our goals is to,
that's why when we started in Japan, we were bringing people
from Japan to see how people lived in Polika.
And, and they're still rooted inthose, in that, in that
heritage, in the way they eat, just the way we eat.
It's about how we live. So showing them how we live.
(43:02):
So this was how we started. And now it's the, the polycar
model is something that Amanasara's visions is to have
500 polycars, you know, existingaround the world.
So building regenerative cities is, is one part of that that
dream that she has. So it's, so these are some of
(43:22):
the ways I can say, but it's, it's difficult to, you know,
come bring it all down into summarizing and all the work.
Remember, I think you've done a good job.
I think for somebody. I think if somebody who doesn't
even have context can get because you've used like real
places and real examples of the kind of works you've done.
And that's super interesting forme also to listen that somebody
who comes from like hotel kitchens then into food
(43:43):
photography and styling is on this board of.
Because mostly what happens is these kind of platforms or these
kind of associations where you have these food policy making or
all the gastro diplomacy and things around it.
It is mostly full of people withiron, historians and
archaeologists and anthropologists and
sociologists. Yeah, which I think is very
important. But again, you can't miss out
the, the, the person who's worked closely with food or
(44:04):
somebody who has like lived experience with food.
So for me, that's very interesting.
And that's again, again, one of the purpose of the podcast to to
make people listen and hear thatit's people, people like you.
And there are many, many more out there who are working with
food and who want, who have these priorities or have these
ethics. And they want to, I want to
invite them to like, say right to institutions you want to work
with. And maybe this position doesn't
exist or maybe they are not looking for a chef as per SE,
(44:25):
But I've known people who've made place for themselves in
these institutions just by persisting and saying that, you
know what, I can contribute some.
And there's a cold methodology around it.
So it's, it's very inspiring to,to hear what you're saying,
Sandhya. And for you, for yourself, like
now after having so many pivots and also like starting into
pivots, like, say, food photography where you were happy
and felt like a good escape and then you got tired of it and
(44:46):
things like that, of knowing somebody who's creatively hungry
and gets and reaches the, the epitome of whatever you do,
what's next for you? Where do you see yourself?
What directions do you want to take after this?
At this moment, I think I'm, I still feel like I have a lot to
do. I mean, last week we were doing
the gastro diplomacy boot camp in Polika.
(45:07):
So we had people coming in from US, the Culinary Institute of
America. It's so interesting.
So we had six students coming infrom the Culinary Institute of
America. We had three indigenous people
coming in from Amazonia. So it was very interesting,
enriching, you know, each and every conversation you felt like
you didn't have enough. You need to more, you need to
have more of these conversations.
(45:28):
You wanna talk about this and you wanna talk about that
because you're having so many connections back home as well.
I don't know how much, but we had so much similarity with
Brazil. I mean, for me, Kerala, I was
connecting so much with Brazil because in terms of the
biodiversity, the way they eat, the culture.
And I was like, OK, we eat this as well.
(45:49):
We cook it this way. You know, we, we use this as an
ingredient and we use this spiceas well.
And it was so amazing the way that we could connect.
And for me, when I am in this kind of environments, I don't
feel like I've had enough. You know, I need more of time.
I want to be in the same mix and, you know, continue to have
these conversations and I want to continue doing this.
(46:10):
I want to continue being this connection that I have in just a
small part, right? I mean, came as a chef.
I mean, the only thing I have totalk about is food.
And that's all is needed to connect with all these people.
All you needed was food and you bring in politics, you bring in
colonization, you bring in trade, you bring in war, you
bring in climate change. Everything is connected to food.
(46:32):
So I think that is a powerful thing itself, what you do.
It's just that you'd, I think you need to be aware that food
has that much power and, you know, go don't be afraid to kind
of go behind those things. Maybe talking about politics
scares you a bit, but I think you need to talk about politics
(46:53):
when you talk about food. I think you need to talk about
colonization when you talk aboutfood.
And I think you need to talk about war when you talk about
food. I think you need to have those
difficult conversations. So and being chefs, we have that
power. That's the thing.
We have that power. We don't know that we have that
power. It's only when you're put in
these kind of environments that you realize it and you're like,
(47:15):
wow, I can talk to this person about colonization that happened
100 years ago, which is still happening.
It's so sad that it's still happening.
I just, I don't think I want to go away from this kind of a
space for at least at least for another few years for sure.
Yeah, no. It's definitely, it's very
interesting to see that you're in a position where, I mean, the
(47:36):
fact that you're not done with it is because it's so different
and so diverse and so many different challenges coming up
every day and the kind of job you do.
And I think it's a great position to be in where you can.
I mean, you have projects which are time bound, but you have
time to switch between them and change, kind of refresh yourself
into something, something interesting, you know, And just
to wrap this up, Sandy I. Mean ask you.
Yeah, it's, I mean, I can completely relate and it's
(47:57):
that's beautiful, I think because you get to like relearn,
re explore, also redefine your priorities, redefine what you,
what you believe in AM. I still thinking, yeah, exactly.
Food, and I'm still creating food.
I mean just that now my ingredients are, you know,
bacteria and fungi probably. Definitely.
That's food that that that is the evolution.
(48:17):
It's still food. I mean, I'm still cooking and
I'm still have these experiences.
Talk about this on the table. Talk about why we need to do
fermentation. You know, those it's, it's, it's
really beautiful how that for me, the journey has been how
I've evolved as a person, as a chef as well.
So yeah. Yeah.
I mean, I think also like the jobs like this have a very great
impact. I mean, very bigger impact,
(48:38):
which is the which is not seen, but it's it's lived.
So maybe I don't know, the people who work in industries
like this are not the biggest, most famous celebrities, but the
impact they have. I mean, the ones who are
celebrities in the chef world are the ones who are serving 50
diners a night. Whereas the ones who are who are
behind the scenes, the ones creating actual impact into,
into millions of lives and communities.
You know, which is, which is ironic.
(48:58):
And which is why also this platforms like this exist where
people can have a voice who don't have the voice and can't
reach the people they have to hear.
And then just the right, the right moment to ask you this
question, Sandhya, for somebody listening to you who's saying,
oh, this sounds interesting, This sounds amazing.
What Sandhya is doing. It's super relatable.
I find myself in, say, the Sandhya 10 years ago.
What would you say to this person?
Like what do they need to do or what kind of advices they need
(49:21):
to listen to be able to, to get where they want to get?
Not exactly where you are, but in their on in their on bubble
where they can get. Think one thing I would, you
know, say is that I never ask questions.
I mean, I was things were comingto me and I was just doing it so
but I'm never to stop asking questions.
No, I mean, I never asked where the food was coming from when I
(49:43):
was working in the hotel. I mean, I didn't, I didn't know
how to ask those questions. Probably I didn't know, you
know, there was a problem in thesupply chain.
I didn't know there was a problem in the food system.
So I think you need to ask me brave and bold enough to ask
those questions. And you know, maybe that
question is going to give you problem, give you a problem with
(50:03):
your chef or your your boss or your supervisor or whatever.
But I think you need to, you know, start asking those
questions. But I, I also feel like the, the
generation now, I mean, I mean, I'm having, I'm interacting a
lot with younger generation because I, it's one of the part
of my work is also education. So we also have interns coming
from Basque as well. You know, so you have students
(50:25):
who want to do an internship andthey already thinking in a
different way when they make thechoice to come and do an
internship with future Food Institute.
They already stepping away from I don't want to be in a Michelin
restaurant. I want to do something different
there itself. They've already made the choice.
So I don't think this generationneeds much of an advice.
I don't think they are afraid or, you know, they have the they
(50:47):
already have that in their mindset.
They want to be regenerated. They are not just, you know,
they're curious about fermentation, they are curious
about anthropology, they're curious about the food waste.
So it's already that that momentum has happened, which
which didn't happen for people coming in from my generation a
decade. We didn't discuss these things,
but now everybody's talking about it.
(51:09):
I mean, maybe it's social media,maybe it's the way things have
changed. Maybe it's that crisis is in
everybody's plate now. So that that that, you know,
that people are out there doing what they think is right.
So I don't feel like I have muchto, you know, kind of encourage
(51:31):
them. They're already in the right
direction. I just hope I can also inspire
and learn from them as well. You know, fun.
Sometimes you lose the courage and then these guys, these
younger generation gives you that, you know, to keep going
on. You're doing it.
So amazing. Somebody just coming and telling
to me, you know, who's just coming out of CIA and telling
me, oh, this is so cool what you're doing.
That's enough. You know, that's kind of my, my,
(51:53):
my field to go forward for the next 10 or 6 months or one year,
definitely. So it's very positive to hear.
I'm very much in agreement with what you say about the comments
you've made. And I mean, there's so much
negative happening in the world that it's it's positive.
See that there is these small circles where these things are
happening and, and the future does look promising.
I think this is just like these in the right place with the with
the right people in it. I feel it's the small impacts
(52:15):
will lead to a bigger, greater future, which we really need at
this moment. So thank you so much, Sandhya.
First of all, accepting this on such a short notice for giving
you time. I bet you inspire a lot of
people listening to this. And and yeah, I hope, I hope we
run into each other. I would love to.
I would love. To yes, if you are ever in
Bologna, please definitely come to the lab.
We'll show you around our cool little secret cave that we have
in the basement. Definitely looking forward to
(52:37):
that. But yeah, thank you so much,
Sandhya. See you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Take care.
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