Healthy children's ready meals go global
The Mini nom nom's and special Gruffalo range would promote healthy eating and would be on sale soon.
The range includes: lamb and chicken tiffins; a fish thali; chicken laska; and a vegetarian tagine.
Founder Lisa Sohanpal has pumped a quarter of a million into the business so far, which would contract the manufacture of healthy and educational ready meals for children, she told FoodManufacture.co.uk.
Turnover millions of pounds
The firm would turn over millions of pounds within five years, after receiving recent interest from retailers in the Middle East, the US and Ireland, she said.
The ready meals would be manufactured by the Lord Noon-owned Bombay Foods in Middlesex, where up to six jobs could be created as a result, said Sohanpal, whose husband Dr Imrat Sohanpal has backed the business.
Ocado would be the first retailer to sell Mini nom nom's next month, but other major supermarkets were being targeted as well, she revealed.
“We’re targeting other retailers and are in the final stages of negotiation with a few of the major multiples,” Sohanpal said, but refused to specify which she was in discussions with.
“We’re talking with a lot of world-wide buyers too and have received interest from companies in the Middle East.”
The Mini nom nom's range was developed to educate children and parents on healthy eating, as well as cuisine from other countries.
Encourage children to eat ready meals
Asked whether children should eat ready meals, she said: “We’re introducing the next generation of ready meals to the market, which is [a market stigmatised] as being high in fat, sugar and salt.
“Mini nom nom's is breaking that mould and we’re saying that we can make convenient ready meals that are healthy as well. We’re also working with Jamie Oliver to promote healthy food.”
The range contains no added salt or sugar and each product has a side dish and a dipping sauce, as well as information on the dish and its country of origin, said Sohanpal.
“There’s nothing like this on the market, despite it being a very relevant product,” she said.
“Parents don’t have a lot of time to cook healthy meals for their children and to give them a ready meal that fills that gap makes perfect sense.”
