Today we’d like to introduce you to Kulvinder, Harbhajan, Pardeep, and Randeep Saini.
Kulvinder, Harbhajan, Pardeep, and Randeep, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
My parents, Kulvinder and Harbhajan Saini, immigrated here in the late 1980s. My father worked in a restaurant for years before he decided to open his own with partners in Newton, MA named Indian Paradise. My mother followed and opened her own homestyle Indian grocery and then a restaurant in Somerville, MA. It was located in the plaza next to the Cobble Hill Apartments. They were living their dreams until one fatal day, my father suffered a stroke and he could not fully use the left side of his body.
At the same time, they had three children, two daughters and one son, who they felt were not being fully raised by them because they were always managing their businesses. In 2005, my father sold his share of the restaurant and my mother sold her grocery store and restaurant. The main reason they did sell was for their children. My mother worked in schools and my father drove a taxi to make ends meet. But a tiny flame still burned inside them, a hope, a wish to possibly open up their own restaurant or business one day.
In 2014, my mother and I, Pardeep Saini, opened a small convenience store in Billerica, MA in the same exact plaza we have the restaurant and ran it for a year until we eventually decided to sell it. I was also attending college at the same time as managing the convenience store. The spot next to us eventually went up for lease and to make my parents’ dream come true, my brother, Randeep, and I decided to help them open a restaurant.
Their main goal was to serve fresh, homemade style, authentic Indian food at the restaurant. They didn’t want anything fancy just a small space to make and serve food that brought a smile on faces while making a little living. IndianStyle was founded by my parents, my brother, and I. We all work to run it together. It is a small American Dream coming to life.
Has it been a smooth road?
With anything, there is always bumps in the road. It took us about 7 months just to be approved by the town hall in order to open the restaurant. Those were some rough 7 months, but we didn’t give up. In the beginning, it was much harder as a brand new restaurant to make a profit.
We were struggling financially especially since we spend all of the budgets on getting the restaurant up and running from last-minute expenses. This caused us problems with ads and marketing because we didn’t have enough. But we worked around and figured it out as we went along.
Now, I feel we are in a much better position as a restaurant than we were last year. We have a few ads out, we are active on our social media, we started a YouTube channel to show customers how we make their food, and we also started a blog talking about the food and its history.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with IndianStyle – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
IndianStyle is a vegetarian, vegan Indian Restaurant. Our menu gravitates towards North Indian style food. Something we say is If we don’t eat it, then we don’t serve it.
Our goal as a restaurant is to serve customers with actual homemade style Indian food that is made from fresh and healthy ingredients. We started out vegetarian, but when we noticed a lot of demand for vegan food we decided to offer vegan alternatives. Our menu already contained vegan items, but some items that contained dairy products, we were able to make vegan while still staying close to the richness of the original.
We, ourselves, are vegetarians, which is why we decided to create a vegetarian restaurant in the first place. One of our most known dishes is Veg. Chicken Tikka Masala. This dish is a vegetarian version of the original, Chicken Tikka Masala. We substituted the chicken with a soybean product that tastes similar to chicken.
We’ve also recently added Burgers, Wraps, rice bowl, and burrito which are all made Indian Style. We serve naans that are created from a vegan-friendly recipe. Overall, we love serving tasty food that puts a smile on our customers’ faces.
Right now, we are looking forward to possibly expanding by the end of January 2018 or beginning of February.
Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
I love the diversity and the willingness of people to try new foods especially from different regions and to learn about the history involving the cuisine. What I least like is snow, it makes delivering food a nightmare!
Contact Info:
- Address: 880 Boston Road, Billerica, MA 01821
- Website: www.indianstylecuisine.com
- Phone: 9785843187
- Email: indianstylecuisine@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/indianstylecuisine/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IndianStyleBillerica/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/indianstyle-billerica-2
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