The stigma attached to the profession of chefs in India has been on the rise over the last few years. The profession is not backed by many people in our country. Anyone who desires to follow cooking as a passion is usually looked down upon. They are tagged or named as Bawarchi, Halwai, or a local tapri-owner.
However, the culinary industry is breaking the stereotypes now. Indian chefs have proved themselves in the International domain as well as in our country. Though India is yet to catch up with this progress and look at cooking like an actual professional respectful job.
Shubhansh Gupta was always fascinated by cooking. He loved cooking from the bottom of his heart. Thus, he decided to give a chance to his true passion. In his journey of becoming a known chef, he faced many ups and downs. There were times when he was on the verge of giving up, but he didn’t back away. He turned the situation in his favor, and he owns an International café in Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh.
Shubhansh Gupta – My Story
I was born and brought up in the small city Jabalpur where I spent my entire childhood and teenage years. I grew up in a food lover’s family. My family loved both eating and cooking. During birthdays and special occasions, my whole family would come together to cook and celebrate. I’d roam around the kitchen to see how the food was being cooked. It was a sort of magical experience for me to see weird things turning into mouth-watering dishes. Everything about cooking intrigued me. In my days, I was an average student.
I knew that the technical, medical, or auditing field was not for me. I wanted to show my creativity and make a mark rather than following a set of norms. So, when I was in 6th standard, I decided that I would follow my passion and become a chef.
I had a difficult school life as I was a shy and introverted child. When people came to know about my dream, they made fun of me. Once, a group of my classmates took my tiffin and replaced it with grass. They asked me to make food out of grass if I wanted to be a Chef.
The bullying became a constant thing, but I didn’t care because my parents supported me. I come from a small town, but my family never saw cooking as an absurd profession. They knew that I was interested in cooking since childhood, and they respected my interest.
When I told them about my decision, they encouraged me and gave me their full support. I took Commerce and along with my studies, I started preparing for the culinary college entrance exam. I prepared for six months and I secured a decent rank in the entrance test. On July 21st, 2014, my dream took its first step.
I remember the first time we were standing in front of the Gateway of India and Taj Palace Hotel, I told my father that “This is the place where I want to work”. It was an overwhelming feeling to see the iconic hotel. That feeling inspired me to work hard in achieving my dream of serving at similar restaurants like Taj within three years.
During my college orientation, everyone was talking about food and I didn’t have any idea of it. At that moment, I realized that I was nowhere in front of these people. I promised myself to work hard and excel.
In the second year, I got my internship at J.W. Marriott. While serving, my seniors told me that interns have to change a lot of departments, but I was limited to only one department. So I thought there was something wrong with me because the management had told me to stick to one department. I asked the Executive Chef if I had done anything wrong or if they didn’t want me. The Chef assured me that I was doing a great job and that’s why they didn’t want to change me. This compliment boosted my morale and I focused more on learning better things.
After finishing the degree, I bagged a campus placement in the world’s second-largest hotel company, Inter-Continental Hotels Group. When I reached Ahmedabad to join my new job, I was skeptical about changing the location, but I thought it would be a new experience, so I migrated from Mumbai to Ahmedabad.
To learn more, I used to work 18 hours a day, even when my colleagues went home after finishing a shift of 9 to 10 hours. I was handling the chores of three departments in Ahmedabad. After seeing my efforts, the management promoted me to the rank of senior manager.
Then in August 2018, my father suffered a brain hemorrhage. My personal life was also great until then. It was a huge blow to me because I was very close to my father. I wanted to be there for him and my family. At the same time, I didn’t want to give up my dream job. Then I realized that I can spend my whole life pursuing my dream, but right now, my family needs me more.
I made an impulsive decision. I submitted my resignation letter to my boss and took the train back to my home, Jabalpur. We, as a family, decided to start a small café. That way, I could stay close to both my work and dad.
After clearing the paperwork, we found a perfect location for the café. On August 10th, 2019, I inaugurated my café. The journey went smoothly. In the beginning, I had thought I would be staying only for six months in Jabalpur, but the café changed my perspective about this small town and made me fall in love with it.
I could see people taking interest in my café. Moreover, I had no boundaries and restrictions. Like, if I want to add a dish to the menu, I can do it without asking anyone. I was free to experiment and I loved it. Now, it has already been two years since I opened, and I’m not planning to leave the city anytime soon.
In the café, instead of limiting to just one cuisine, we serve a variety of meals.
The menu consists of food from the Middle East, America, Italy, Germany, Russia, Caribbean Islands, and many other places. So, in a way, one can truly say we are an international café.
Our international menu with unpaid and genuine reviews are the two things that draw the attention of customers. We focus on international food to give ourselves a touch of uniqueness.
When covid hit us, I had to close the restaurant and I only earned for two months in these two years. It was a tough battle to fight because I had expenses to manage, staff to pay, and EMIs to give. Meanwhile, many of my close relatives succumbed to death, which affected my mental health.
I knew that I’ll have to regain the profit otherwise my café will cease to exist.
We knew that we needed to regain the pre-covid pace after lockdown, otherwise our café may exit from the market.
To recover from the loss, everyone at the café decided to be defensive. We worked more aggressively. We didn’t cut staff like other restaurants and kept on experimenting with our food for which we were known. Furthermore, we increased the number of dishes from 78 to 250.
We all didn’t take a break for a single minute. Now, our café is famous all over Jabalpur for its uniqueness and taste. To be true, after resigning from the top restaurant, I never thought I would ever open my café. But things have turned out better than I expected them to be.
I have learned many lessons from my life. The one that I would like to share with each one of you is, ‘Don’t fear failure. If I had thought of not following my passion because of what people said, I wouldn’t have reached here. We must dream about something, and we must work for it. Success or failure is in the future’s hands. But the journey to the dream will itself be more fulfilling than the destination.’
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