A Perth couple have been presented with a prestigious culinary award.
Praveen and Swarna Kumar won big at Scotland’s Premier Independent Curry Event, the SPICE awards.
The award for outstanding contribution (central region) rewarded Praveen and Swarna for how their family business has boosted the Asian food industry in Scotland.
The pair went along to the SPICE Awards at the Crowne Plaza in Glasgow on September 11.
Praveen and his wife are behind Tabla Restaurant on South Street, the Indian Cook School in Perth 's Edinburgh Road and Praveen Kumar - Authentic Indian Cuisine, a popular brand of ready meal takeaways made in Perth and available at farm shops and delivered all over the UK.
Praveen heard the host talking about ‘a couple’ ‘ Perth ’ and his ears pricked up.
He and his wife were overjoyed when they were called up on stage to be honoured for the 13 years they have dedicated to building their businesses, receiving the award for outstanding contribution.
What was originally just Tabla, a single restaurant, has grown arms and legs with his frozen sideline expanding rapidly. Now frozen takeaways are mailed out nationwide with the butter chicken a huge seller.
“We stand out because we use local suppliers. We use real butchers and farmers. I preach pride in ingredients and this helps the local economy.
“We are doing all we can during the current economic turbulence,” Praveen said. He had to up prices by 10 per cent last month to keep everything ‘sustainable’ with sources of local ingredients.
This contribution award was one of three awards which Praveen and his team bagged at SPICE 2022.
The frozen meals, Praveen Kumar Authentic Indian Cuisine took best takeaway (Central) with Perth 's Everest Inn as a runner up.
Tabla Indian Restaurant won highly commended, being the runner up in best restaurant (Central).
Praveen explained he has been looking for crowdfunding to expand and there are just under three weeks to reach a target of raising £150,000 from public investment. He’s halfway there with £79,695.43 raised by 90 investors.
The link to get involved is at https://www.crowdcube.com/companies/praveenkumar-com/pitches/qBjjwq?fbclid=IwAR0SfBFWTuWXlP2mFHJhQCTHEBKG8sL_Rdc2uAF9pm4YxWN8i53Wy16f_mU
