Amateurs turn a penchant for cooking into a chain of stores selling healthy innovations of popular snacks

Childhood friends Ajay Gadiar and Kedar Naik (both residents of Thane then) remember looking on with admiration as their fathers cooked up delicious meals together. Years later, the 41-year-old friends continue their fathers’ legacy, whipping up commonly savoured snacks made unusual with an innovative twist of recipe.

After starting AK’s Bakers & More, a tiny snack shop in Lokhandwala as a try-out, in 2007, it took just two years for these foodies to expand to Bandra, Santacruz, and Kandivali. Their fastest selling product? Pat comes the reply: “Baked vada pavs!”

Kedar explains, “Vada pav is one snack we could never resist - as youngsters during college days and till date. The problem is, hours after gulping down the golden fried vadas sizzling in the fresh pavs, we’d experience uneasiness and acidity. One day, merely about two months ago, Ajay and I were wondering how to make the vada pav healthier and said why not put it in the oven. Later, we also decided to do away with the unhealthy besan covering and wrap it in wheat bread instead.”

It was just an experiment, but today the friends are still amazed at how the baked vada pav with wheat bread has caught customers’ fancy. “It is the fastest selling product, people just love it. Vada pav is such a ubiquitous snack that we are getting party and house function orders in bulk,” Ajay says.

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