Couple can help you to make a meal of it

Couple can help you to make a meal of it

Tania and Toru Yanada are running a Enterprise HQ business - and the home they base it in could be yours.

The couple are making a real success out of laying on gourmet dinner parties for customers in their own homes.

Yanada Personal Chef Service caters for parties of up to 18. Tania and Toru are based at their home near Bridgnorth but cook in their clients’ kitchens to ensure the meal is served at its best.

Toru was sous chef at Madame Toki, the leading French restaurant in Tokyo, which is where he met globetrotting Tania.

“I was actually in publishing but when you marry a chef the only way to see them is to be in the restaurant business yourself, so I decided on a career change,” she explained.

The couple travelled to Australia, where Toru worked in a Lebanese restaurant before they decided to return to England.

Toru then worked at two-Michelin-starred Hibiscus in Ludlow before moving on to The Hundred House at Norton, near Bridgnorth.

The couple then worked together at Simpsons in Birmingham with Toru, naturally enough, in the kitchen and Tania front of house.

After a year there, they decided to go into business for themselves and set up Yanada Personal Chef Service at their current base near Bridgnorth.

“We renovated one of my parents’ outbuildings to incorporate a practice kitchen. We prepare the majority of the meals in the customer’s home to ensure it is fresh,” said Tania.

The company specialises in fine dining, preparing and serving a choice of traditional English, modern European and Lebanese dishes.

Prices start from £25 a head and can rise to around £75, with a minimum charge of £250 per party.

“We cook, serve each course and clean everything away. You can simply sit back in the company of your guests and enjoy with them the experience of an exceptional meal.”

A buffet menu is also available as an alternative to the full-blown dinner party.

“We take over the complete organisation of the occasion. One of the big benefits for the customer is that they can have a top-class restaurant meal without going out. The kids can be at home with you so you don’t need a babysitter and you don’t need to worry about driving home afterwards.”

The business started five months ago and Tania is delighted with the public response.

“It’s going very well. We are not fully-booked but we are busy. We have had quite a few customers from the Woverhampton area, as well as people coming from London to stay in holiday cottages, who have wanted a holiday treat.

“We are also building up the Shropshire side of the business and have exhibited at Ludlow and Church Stretton food festivals.”

Another side of the business is Toru’s Culinary Masterclasses, which cost £150 for half a day and £235 for a full day.

“You can have an individual masterclass on a one-to-one basis or a class for a group of up to five. And the charge is the same so if you have a group obviously you can share the cost and it is much cheaper. People seem to think the charges are very reasonable,” said Tania.

In fact, a bed and breakfast business in Shrewsbury has approached Tania about working the masterclasses into a weekend break package.

Tania is delighted with the benefits so far of being a member of Enterprise HQ, the innovative project to help home-based businesses launched by Shropshire Enterprise Partnership in a unique link-up with the Shropshire Star in April.

“I have found it to be very helpful. Knowing they are there is very reassuring when you are setting up a business on your own.”

Tania said she was considering enrolling on some of the business-boosting courses run by the scheme at its headquarters, Enterprise HQ, in Roushill, Shrewsbury.