The holy grail of bunny chows

Multi-award winning bunny chow chef, Danny Naidoo believes the secret to the perfect bunny chow is to never compromise on quality spices.
This Tongaat resident is the 2013 and 2010 ABI/The Baking Pan Barometer Bunny Chow competition winner (he took second place in 2011 and 2012). The competition aims is to discover Durban’s best bunny chow.
“I wish I could take all the credit for my recipes but I learned the true art of making curry from my mother in-law, Radha Moopanar who is the best cook I know,” said Danny.
Danny has loved cooking since a young age and dreamed of owning a curry house when he grew up.
But life pushed him in the opposite direction – to the oil drilling industry in Angola.
After years in Angola he tried working as a car salesman but the childhood dream would not die.
In 2008 he took the plunge and opened Danny’s House of Curries.
His wife Rajini supported the new business venture and they sacrificed family time with their sons to learn the recipes from her mother.
Danny said the business would have failed had it not been for the dedication of his wife, her mother and his brother in-law Krish.
“They put in the sweat and tears to help me realise my dream.”
He has since hired another chef, Roy Reddy, as Rajini has returned to her para-legal job.
Reddy has become his right hand man and they share a common dedication to the craft.
“Cooking is an art and if you want to produce a great painting then you need to know your paints and how to mix them well. It is the same with spices, well mixed spices will never disappoint. However if you sacrifice on the quality of your spices then you are bound to have disappointed customers,” said Danny.
He said even though he was happy with the recipes he is currently using, he was not above learning something new. Because of the high demand for his bunny chows outside of Tongaat in 2011 he started renting a place in Ottawa “to see if all the hype was real”.
“In 2012 I bought the place because I could see that people were happy with my food there. I think what has made my curries so famous is because they are not as pungent as most Indian curries. When running a curry house you need to cook for everyone’s palate not just people of Indian decent,” he concluded.