Divya Raghavendra Rao, co-founder and managing director of Rameshwaram Cafe, the quick service restaurant chain that has been the talk of Bengaluru since it opened its first outlet in 2021, answers the question on the mind of everyone who has eaten there: How much ghee does the restaurant use?
“We make 30-35 ghee podi dosas from a litre packet of ghee,” she says. That’s a 30 ml shot of ghee per dosa.
Rameshwaram Cafe, which has four outlets in Bangalore, will make its 15,000 sq ft Hyderabad debut on Jan. 19. The popular eatery is named after the birthplace of APJ Abdul Kalam because co-founder Raghavendra Rao was inspired by the former president’s ‘dream big’ mantra. It has 900 employees and one Twitter user estimated that the company generates Rs 4.5 crore monthly business per outlet. The founders have never confirmed or denied this claim.
The cafe’s liberal use of ghee is urban legend in this part of the country. Instagram reels satirise life before and after Rameshwaram Cafe.
Images of a man emerging from a holy dip and social butterfly Orhan ‘Orry' Awatramani draped snugly on glamorous actors both serve as memes for the dosa chain that first went viral because of this love for clarified butter. The images represent swimming in ghee and ghee on everything on the menu respectively. There are memes that poke fun at those who write bad reviews of Rameshwaram Cafe too.
When we talk, Divya Raghavendra Rao has a ready ghee pitch. “Ghee is good for gut health, skin, digestion, eases colic,” she says. “Besides, you can ask for less ghee.”
Other points she makes: You can see the amount of ghee used because her restaurants have open kitchens. At most places, you can never be sure of how much ghee or oil is being used in the food.
But ghee is only the topping in this success story. In an industry where the majority fail in their first year of operation, it’s now possible to examine some of the reasons Rameshwaram emerged a winner.
Divya Raghavendra Rao’s working life can also be divided into a before and after Rameshwaram Cafe. Before, she was an early riser, and her day began at 4 a.m. Now her restaurants close at 1 a.m. and her day ends after she has completed review calls with her managers. She returns home from office only at 2-3 a.m. The mother of a one-month old infant has hired three neonatal nurses who work in shifts and thanks to them, she can continue working at an unchanged pace. “He’s a very expensive baby,” she says, laughing. There’s a brief pause in our conversation when her son demands her attention: “No crying chinna (small one), mama is there, no crying.”
She’s a chartered accountant by training and the couple met when Raghavendra Rao, or Raghav as she calls him, came to her for a consultation. He is an engineer who got into the food business early. “He’s worked many jobs such as cashier, manager, helper, kitchen assistant,” she says. He even managed a street side food cart and Rameshwaram is his second attempt at the restaurant business.
Her skill with numbers and his experience in the restaurant business were perfectly complementary, and they have clearly defined roles. “At work he’s the CEO, I’m the MD. We don’t get into each others business,” Rao says, adding that while Raghav handles the kitchen, operations and training, she’s in charge of stores, accounts, branding, sales and promotion, licences, costing, marketing and administration.
Divya Raghavendra Rao and husband Raghavendra Rao. (Photo: Rameshwaram Cafe)
They are philosophically aligned too. “Both of us wanted a partner who would support the other's career goals. He never asks me where I’m going or what time I’ll return,” she says. “We work round the clock and don’t keep our mobile phones on silent."
Family support was not forthcoming when the couple announced they were starting Rameshwaram Cafe. “My people didn’t want me to quit my job. They said ‘What are you trying to do? You’re an IIM graduate’,” she says. “Employees became our family when our family went away.”
Even before all the ghee memes and reels, the restaurant partnered with food bloggers to showcase its strengths. It has a strong social media game and quickly became a celebrity favourite. It’s carved a place as one of those things to do when you’re in Bangalore. When Masterchef host Gary Mehigan visited recently, he said he tried the ragi dosa, ghee roast dosa, medu vada, ghee podi idli, kesari baath and “some seriously great filter coffee”.
In this thoughtful piece on Bangalore’s darshini wars, Rameswaram Cafe features in a crowdsourced list of the city’s best, alongside legends that have been around for decades. It may be the 100th year of the legendary Mavalli Tiffin Rooms or MTR but online, you’ll find more people talking about the new upstart.
At 800 sq ft, the first Indiranagar outlet may look modest but it complements the 4,000 sq ft kitchen located one kilometre away. Operationally, there have been several changes such as the upgradation of kitchen equipment. For example, the restaurant now uses ceramic burners that distribute heat evenly.
There’s a lot of attention to detail. The Hyderabad menu offers local specialities such as punugulu and ragi sankati; it has peanut chutney instead of coconut; and, of course, the food is spicier.
Rao offers some guidelines for entrepreneurs:
Run your business peacefully, be calm and patient, nothing comes easily.
Trust your business partner, build your team and look after them because you can’t do everything yourself. Yet know how everything works.
Gain knowledge first, don’t just jump into a business for money.
Women, don’t forgo what you’ve built after you get married and have babies. Take care of your physical and mental health. If you’re healthy, you can handle everything. Come out of your comfort zone, don’t expect to sit at home and wait for everything to come to you. Be prepared for your family to not accept your work life.
Eat breath sleep business. Depend on hard work, not luck. Don’t think of profit, just work.
Clearly, success depends more than just the quantity of ghee you pour over a dosa.
Priya Ramani is a Bengaluru-based journalist and is on the editorial board of Article-14.com.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of NDTV Profit or its editorial team.
