Hello people on the internet! I’m Rupal and I’m so happy to see you here.
I was born and raised in Goa, India with all the joys of small town life, great beaches and the freshest seafood. Like many around me, I went to university, got a Masters Degree in Marketing and Finance (MBA) and went on to have a 10 year career working for some of the biggest multi-national corporations and managed some of the world’s most recognised brands. I moved from India to Dubai, UAE in 2009 and made it home base for 9 years.
That time in Dubai did so much for me – I found my voice and values as an adult, an incredible partner/husband who is generally just a great all-round awesome human, made travelling/exploring the world a life mission, made my first kitchen and began cooking food at home everyday. All of our travels around the globe shaped my understanding of people, cuisines, cultures, historical context and how it all comes together on a plate of food we eat. I understood life’s greatest lesson – we are all fundamentally the same, have similar aspirations and seek comfort in the familiar. What’s unique is our own perspective, life experiences and what we bring to the table in terms of our specific skills, values and actions. It is this approach that shaped my cooking.
What started off as a way to enjoy familiarity of the food of my culture/family grew into a passion that had to be made into a profession. Over the years of powerpoint presentations and marketing strategy, I realised plain and simple, how much more I cared about how perfectly cooked my rice is, how balanced my prawn curry is, how my fish flakes to touch, how long it actually takes to caramelise onions and what joy it brought me to feed people and watch them eat with abandon!
What started off as a little food blog in 2012 (it was called Foodie&Fabulous back in the day), reading endless cookbooks and many hours spent in the kitchen cooking led to us moving to Australia in 2018. I went to culinary school to complete my Professional Cookery and Patisserie certification and now for over two years have been working as a chef in some of Melbourne’s most respected restaurants! That I get to live, cook, work in this city and call it home is really a dream come true for me – I pinch myself often. Melbourne is truly multicultural – it thrives in its diversity, has all the seasons and the incredible local produce that comes with it, the very best coffee (flat-whites for life), a dynamic varied dining scene, artsy hidden laneways and cosy neighbourhoods that you’d never have a dull moment. If my time here has taught me anything it’s that hard work and believing in your crazy dreams does pay off, that it is never too late to change course, to pursue what gives your life purpose and joy is worthwhile, that a job in a commercial kitchen might be hard but being able to share my food, see the immense happiness it brings to people who don’t even know you is something I want to do for the rest of my life!
So on this website or any other platform I’m on (you can say hi on Instagram here) I just want to be able to share my love for delicious food, be an authentic voice for the cuisine I grew up with (Goan/Indian), showcase my learnings from travels around the world and my understanding food cultures. I hope you liked what you saw and that you’ll return again and again!