We visit Takeaway Innovations Expo featuring Just Eat
- Ben Carter - Just Eat
- Hannah McCollum - ChicP
- Ashmail Mushtaq - Mushtaq's
- Gary Evans - Synergy Grill
- Tara Mei - Bread and Butter Festival
Sue Nelson and Paul Andrews are back in the studio and catch up over the Takeaway Innovations Expo and their joy over being best placed for spotting trends and new foodie noms.
Next up we have Jeremy Eames joining Sue and meeting Hannah McCollum, founder of ChicP, a rare healthy option amongst all of the greasy, fried offerings that seem to be dominating the Takeaway Innovation Expo - who'd have thought it?! ChicP was born out of a love for houmous and a hate for food waste and Jeremy is fully on board believing that food retailers should be responsible for reducing the amount of food they end up throwing away. Digging into a golden turmeric and ginger based houmous, new to FoodTalk tasting, Jeremy thinks it's perfect, but may have a slightly confused palate as he thinks the next one tastes a bit like cheese! Sue is quick to counter that it doesn't, and gets more of a herby flavour. To be fair, Jeremy is allergic to dairy and hasn't eaten any cheese for many years!
Jeremy and Sue meet Ashmail Mushtaq of Mushtaq's - the largest kitchen in the UK, with 55 chefs cooking fresh Indian food. Sue loves Indian cuisine, so she's rather excited at the prospect of having this food done properly but on a huge scale and is planning her Friday night takeaway - perhaps she could be one of Mushtaq's 1000 weekend night deliveries? Sue marvels at Ashmail's slim figure which he puts down to Mushtaq's Indian food not having any of the westernised fattening additives like cream that you tend to get in UK curries.
Next Sue gets to meet Gary Evans whose Synergy Grill has just won an award at the Takeaway Innovations Expo. Sue is amazed at this greaseless grill, where the fat can just be hoovered away! A rather excited Sue got to witness the dust vacuumed away, but wouldn't have believed it if she hadn't seen it with her own eyes. Sue's also rather pleased to learn that there's lots of energy being saved by using one of Gary's grills. He's surprised no one else had thought of it yet, as he puts his creation down to knowledge gained during secondary school science - a bit above Sue's head, she failed her Chemistry O Level.
Back in the studio and Paul and Sue are joined by Tara Mei of Bread and Butter Festival; a food entrepreneur gathering born out of Tara's own personal experiences of starting a food business and finding it a bit of a lonely road. Paul recognises that people starting a food venture often do it from a place of passion, but can struggle with the business side of things. Sue is keen to hear who will be featured at the festival and the themes they'll be tackling, also keenly noting that some of the guest speakers have been here on the FoodTalk show!
