Chachu’s at Home is hoping to offer quality, affordable and freshly pre-prepared Indian meals with its new home-delivery service.

“My brother-in-law, who’s from the UK, told us how you could go to a Tesco or Waitrose and pick up a bag of a full Indian meal for £25, and that was basically dinner sorted, so that’s where the idea for Chachu’s at Home came from,” co-owner Priya Cincotta tells Broadsheet.

Chachu’s at Home is the spin-off brand of Chachu’s, a bricks-and-mortar operation owned by Cincotta’s dad, Sunil “Sunny” Arora. He had venues located in various Sydney shopping centre food courts, but has had to close them all during the most recent lockdown.

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“My dad’s such an optimist; he just doesn’t give up. He was kind of like, ‘How can we continue the business?’ So, I sat down with my husband, Rick, and we just thought about how we could adapt to what’s happened,” Cincotta says.

The menu for Chachu’s at Home is a mix of favourites, including butter chicken, lamb vindaloo and chicken tandoori, as well as dishes less commonly found in Australia, such as Amritsari fish, which is deep-fried in a chickpea-flour batter with coriander seeds and a “secret” masala mix. There’s also chicken kadai, a spicy chicken curry with diced onion, capsicum and tomatoes.

“We were trying to think of things we would cook at home [and] what we kind of miss when we go out to Indian restaurants,” Cicnotta says.

On the day of delivery, each dish is freshly cooked and cooled before being professionally sealed, so it’s ideal to store in the fridge or freezer and reheat. “It’s like meal prep – you don’t have to eat it that day. I have one woman who lives by herself and she’s super busy; she just orders a bunch of maybe 10 of our curries at a time and whacks them into a freezer. She doesn’t have to think about it for ages.”

You can order à la carte or pick from one of the generous meal boxes designed to share. To get the best bang for buck, build your own box. For $80, you’ll get three curries of your choice, two large serves of rice, two garlic naans, two plain naans, two onion bhajis, two samosas, mint sauce and raita.

While you’re placing your order, there’s also the option to donate $10, which will buy a Chachu’s meal for someone in need. All donations will be matched dollar-for-dollar by Chachu’s. So far, some of the donations have gone towards supporting charity organisation Sydney Food Share, and there are also plans to donate meals to frontline workers at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital.

“I’m a huge believer in paying it forward. It’s something that’s very, very dear to my heart. Even before we launched, we knew this was something that we were going to incorporate, especially through this difficult time.”

Chachu’s at Home Inner West delivers to suburbs in the inner west, west, inner city and south. Orders for those suburbs can be placed online here. There is also a northern beaches branch that delivers to the north shore, northern beaches and eastern suburbs. Orders for those suburbs can be placed online here. Delivery is a $10 flat fee.