I received an invitation from Arohan Foods, the makers of the Choice Pork Natural range of products, to visit their Guwahati office and to sample a few of their products. What piqued my interest the most was that this company dealt exclusively with pork. Added to that was the fact that it was based in the NE and claimed to use fresh Indian ingredients only, sourced mainly from the North East. I asked the hubby if he would like to check them out and he eagerly agreed.
We found the office in what looked like a residential building and proceeded to go up. A bright and clean space, the first thing I noticed was a line of huge freezers. Just the thought of packets and packets of pork products sitting in there chilling made me happy :)
We were ushered into the office and introduced to Anabil Goswami, Head - Strategy and Business Development, who welcomed us very warmly. We settled down in his office for a long chat about Choice Pork Natural and of course, all their products. Anabil won me over in minutes. I asked him what made him start Choice Pork Natural and his answer was three magical words "I love pork". If you know me at all you know that these words are absolute music to my ears. It's why I started The Porkaholics on Facebook!
Anabil is one of three friends who got together to start Arohan Foods and launch Choice Pork Natural as a brand. He told me how they were particular about showcasing pork as the star and insisted on having the word pork in the brand name itself. There's no doubt that pork is not exactly the most popular meat in India and there are many biases against it.
Many of us also have misconceptions about the NE, it's people, the cultures, and how enterprising (or not) they are. Anabil and his partners wanted to change a few of these misconceptions and decided to set up a company that would sell its products across the nation - products from the NE, a brand from the NE, with ingredients sourced mainly from the NE, manufactured in the NE.
And thus, around three years ago they started Choice Pork Natural which is now available in Delhi, Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Bangalore, and of course all over the NE states. I was really happy to find out that Hypercity stocks their products because that means I have easy access. They are also in talks with an online grocery chain so you might soon be able to order their products online.
As we talked about the company a parade of the products began to appear in front of us. Sausages, frankfurters, salami, mortadella, bacon, the parade was endless! And it was delicious.
Here are pictures of some of the stuff we ate-
Juicy porky sausages flavoured with allspice berries. These were just fantastic. Since these came out towards the beginning I greedily ate two forgetting about the goodies that were going to follow! We also had garlic flavoured sausages which we forgot to take pictures of.
The hubby loved these, I wasn't so impressed. But that's a personal taste thing and I have to say these were juicy and full of pork.
Lightly grilled slices of salami with bits of fat scattered in each slice making them juicy and delicious. Choice Pork Natural products are made with absolutely no fillers - there's pork meat, fat, salt and spices. No soya. And believe me, we could taste the difference.
As you can see there's a nice balance of meat and fat on these bacon strips. Compared to the bacon I've eaten so far I found these to be very low in salt. Now o one hand low salt is an excellent thing, but since we associate a salty taste with bacon I was a little confused with this one. It's excellent quality bacon though and I would love to make my bacon jam with this.
This belly roll was made on trial and launched only locally in Guwahati during Christmas and New Year. It was the best Indian processed pork product I have ever eaten and I cannot wait for it to be launched properly all over India. Can you just imagine these with a couple of fried eggs and toast for breakfast? Heaven on a plate!
Mortadella with pistachios! I love this combination and I'm really glad that there's an Indian company making it and doing a good job of it too!
You can see more about the products and where they're available on the Choice Pork Natural Facebook page
The visit to the Choice Pork Natural office in Guwahati was one of the highlights of our trip to Assam. We had plans of going out for lunch but after this smorgasbord of delicious pork in every avatar we just rolled back home!
We found the office in what looked like a residential building and proceeded to go up. A bright and clean space, the first thing I noticed was a line of huge freezers. Just the thought of packets and packets of pork products sitting in there chilling made me happy :)
We were ushered into the office and introduced to Anabil Goswami, Head - Strategy and Business Development, who welcomed us very warmly. We settled down in his office for a long chat about Choice Pork Natural and of course, all their products. Anabil won me over in minutes. I asked him what made him start Choice Pork Natural and his answer was three magical words "I love pork". If you know me at all you know that these words are absolute music to my ears. It's why I started The Porkaholics on Facebook!
Anabil is one of three friends who got together to start Arohan Foods and launch Choice Pork Natural as a brand. He told me how they were particular about showcasing pork as the star and insisted on having the word pork in the brand name itself. There's no doubt that pork is not exactly the most popular meat in India and there are many biases against it.
Many of us also have misconceptions about the NE, it's people, the cultures, and how enterprising (or not) they are. Anabil and his partners wanted to change a few of these misconceptions and decided to set up a company that would sell its products across the nation - products from the NE, a brand from the NE, with ingredients sourced mainly from the NE, manufactured in the NE.
And thus, around three years ago they started Choice Pork Natural which is now available in Delhi, Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Bangalore, and of course all over the NE states. I was really happy to find out that Hypercity stocks their products because that means I have easy access. They are also in talks with an online grocery chain so you might soon be able to order their products online.
As we talked about the company a parade of the products began to appear in front of us. Sausages, frankfurters, salami, mortadella, bacon, the parade was endless! And it was delicious.
Here are pictures of some of the stuff we ate-
Juicy porky sausages flavoured with allspice berries. These were just fantastic. Since these came out towards the beginning I greedily ate two forgetting about the goodies that were going to follow! We also had garlic flavoured sausages which we forgot to take pictures of.
The hubby loved these, I wasn't so impressed. But that's a personal taste thing and I have to say these were juicy and full of pork.
Lightly grilled slices of salami with bits of fat scattered in each slice making them juicy and delicious. Choice Pork Natural products are made with absolutely no fillers - there's pork meat, fat, salt and spices. No soya. And believe me, we could taste the difference.
As you can see there's a nice balance of meat and fat on these bacon strips. Compared to the bacon I've eaten so far I found these to be very low in salt. Now o one hand low salt is an excellent thing, but since we associate a salty taste with bacon I was a little confused with this one. It's excellent quality bacon though and I would love to make my bacon jam with this.
This belly roll was made on trial and launched only locally in Guwahati during Christmas and New Year. It was the best Indian processed pork product I have ever eaten and I cannot wait for it to be launched properly all over India. Can you just imagine these with a couple of fried eggs and toast for breakfast? Heaven on a plate!
Mortadella with pistachios! I love this combination and I'm really glad that there's an Indian company making it and doing a good job of it too!
You can see more about the products and where they're available on the Choice Pork Natural Facebook page
The visit to the Choice Pork Natural office in Guwahati was one of the highlights of our trip to Assam. We had plans of going out for lunch but after this smorgasbord of delicious pork in every avatar we just rolled back home!
1 comment:
Too good. Got me drooling! :)
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