Sandwiched between a tobacconist and a bottle shop on a suburban Melbourne shopping strip, an hour’s tram ride east of the CBD, there is nothing exceptional about the location of the former Rich Mahal eatery. But it is a special place for Ashvin Khorana. After she arrived from Malaysia as a student about 20 years ago, it was the first Malaysian-Indian restaurant Khorana dined at with her best friend, Michelle Pereira.
The pair went on to work in telecommunications but the kitchen was calling. “We wanted to own a place where we could showcase the south Indian [and] Malaysian food of our childhood,” Khorana says.
