Meeting over meals

BENGALURU: Meeting new people, and learning about different experiences has been something many missed doing since the pandemic. And now that things have opened up, these gatherings are taking place in various forms across the city. One of those is community dining – a gathering where foodies come together and enjoy good food, have a chat over it and network with each other.

The Courtyard in Shantinagar, known for community dining gatherings, opened for a short period when the lockdowns seemed to be settling down last year but it’s picked up once again now with few Covid-19 protocols. Akhila Srinivas, the founder, says their Food Project (what the brand has termed the community dining concept) is an idea to provide a niche experience for diners and chefs alike. “We’ve been doing this since 2019 but the outbreak of Covid- 19 put a stop to it.

Of late, along with the experiences we’re offering, we also decorate the place according to particular themes,” she says, explaining that when chef Kavan Kuttappa of Naru Noodle Bar hosts a meal, the space was decorated to look like a street in Tokyo that gave it a ramen bar spin. “There are usually about 20 to 30 diners who participate in the event, depending on how much the chef can handle. Sometimes, based on the theme, it ends up being a day event or over the weekend,” says Srinivas, adding that they have increased these meet-ups from once a month to thrice a month.

“We have a sandwich pop-up coming up where chefs are asked to make their gourmet version of it. There’s also a Pride movie screening taking place where the food will be themed ‘Eat your Rainbow’,” she adds. Taking it to other cities as well is The Soul Company. Cofounder Somanna Muthanna says that they have hosted community dining events in Mumbai, Delhi, Puducherry and Kolkata, along with Bengaluru. “For The Ministry of Crab event we hosted recently, we anticipated about 40 people but we got more than 50 on both the days, including more on the waitlist,” he says, adding that diners are willing to pay more if they know the experience is going to be unique. “We have another event with Big Forkers coming up this weekend and we want to see how it’ll go to plan more.

A similar format has been done by the team of Big Forkers in Goa, so we’re hoping the format will be a good one for more in Bengaluru too,” Muthanna says. Conosh, a food experience platform, switched to home delivery methods. However, they are now back again with inperson meetups. Given that Conosh is a space for home chefs, even these dining experiences are held at the hosts’ homes. “We had home chef Bhavini who made authentic Gujarati food for about 10 people at her home. Masterchef Mahendra set a table with a Himalayan trail which included dishes from Tibet, Nepal and Ladhak. Both of these happened recently and there was a good number of people requesting to join in as well,” co-founder Vaibhav Bahl explains.