Vegan 'soul food' restaurant Amrutha Lounge launches crowdfund as it plans second site
The Earlsfield restaurant, which is led by chefs Arvin Suntaramoorthy and Shyam Kotecha, is looking to raise £25,000 via Kickstarter, which it says will cover about 50% of the total funds required to open its recently-secured second site, located in Honor Oak.
Amrutha Lounge opened its first restaurant in 2018, having initially launched as a street food truck doing food markets, private events and music festivals back in 2015.
The menu features a selection of plant-based dishes drawn predominately from both Asian and Middle Eastern cuisine. They include a Thai green curry with green vegetables, potatoes, mushroom and aubergine; beetroot and coconut gazpacho topped with cashew and dill cream; and a 'soul bowl' of kale salad, sautéed mung bean sprouts, cashew cheese, sesame slaw, Asian salad, lentil falafels and cherry tomatoes.
"We're at the point now where we're ready to open our second restaurant," says Suntaramoorthy.
"Everyday we have a restaurant full of delighted guests and a team that really loves coming to work; why would you not grow and replicate this in some way."
Amrutha Lounge describes itself as a 'community-based restaurant', running workshops and classes on the days it is closed for local residents that cover topics including cookery, meditation and choir practise.
It also promotes a 'fair price' policy whereby if a guest feels that their meal did not provide value, they can pay whatever they want for it; and a programme that allows guests who can't afford to pay for their meal at all to volunteer some time working in the restaurant in exchange for dining there.
"For a while now, we've been analysing and documenting everything we do at Amrutha in Earlsfield, and we truly believe this is a great time to expand the work we do."
At the time of writing, the crowdfund, which launched yesterday (28 November) and is set to run until 27 December, has raised £3,289 from 48 backers.
The Kickstarter offers a tiered rewards system, ranging from those pledging £25 or more receiving a copy of the forthcoming Amrutha recipe book, to anyone who pledges £2,000 or more offered the opportunity to hire out the whole restaurant for a dinner party.
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