Anumon CR
Director of operations
Bringing authentic and culture specific cuisines to international palate has always been Anumon’s forte. Anumon started his hospitality career in 2007 with India’s multiple award-winning premium luxury hotel chain Leela Kempinski. He has since worked with some of the finest, world class brands including The Ritz Carlton, The Oberoi, Intercontinental and Aitken Spence.
With almost one decade of experience in designing true, farm to table Indian and international culinary delicacies, Anumon moved to New Zealand in 2015. His extensive knowledge in the wide repertoire of culinary traditions of the different regions of India, and especially of Kerala, the spice capital of the world, has been put to good use in bringing the guilty pleasures of exotic, gourmet food to New Zealand taste buds too. Since 2019, he has been looking after the operations of Aroma Hospitality Ltd trading as Pappadomz and excelling in enticing customers of fine taste to an explosion of ethnic food flavours.
Benjamin Benny
Chef De Cuisine
Anxious to meet the one in charge of the gourmet, the one responsible for your culinary adventure – we present Benny, our Chef de Cuisine.
Benny arrived in New Zealand on 2016, pursued a level 5 International Diploma in Cookery. He has been employed in the hospitality industry for the last 6 years. Benny flagged off his career at the Millennium Hotels and Resorts, and thereafter worked with Ryman Healthcare as a chef de partie. In the course of his carrier, Benny has worked collaboratively with skilled culinary veterans around New Zealand and acquired profound knowledge in to the workings of the food production industry.
Ratheesh
Culinary Director
Diversity and local flavours define Indian cuisine, and Ratheesh’s culinary career has always been characterised by sumptuous food experimentations to encapsulate this diversity in its tasteful essence. Equipped with a Diploma in Hotel Management in 2005, he fine tuned his skills in authentically capturing the spice universe that set apart Indian and especially South Indian cuisine at Cochin Crown Plaza, part of luxury hotel chain Intercontinental Hotels Group.
With his ingenuity in recreating diverse regional delicacies of South India in all its piquant glory, he enthralled international food hunters by satiating their quest for culturally rooted Indian dishes in renowned hotel brands like Radisson and Crown Plaza. Before moving to New Zealand in 2015, Ratheesh won accolades and rave reviews from food enthusiasts through his South Indian Food festivals, which he conducted at various branches of Intercontinental Hotel Group for four years. These food festivals in its various editions, plated whole spectrum of South Indian cuisine ranging from savory dishes typical of the region to the exotic ones sourced from food traditions exclusive to certain communities and localities.
He moved to New Zealand to helm the kitchen of New Zealand’s top rated South Indian Restaurant, Arranged Marriage, Palmerston North, and attracted the gastronomes who were craving for authentic South Indian viand. With experience spanning almost two decades in exploring the diverse strands of hybrid food heritage of South India, Ratheesh has sharpened his culinary skills to become an ambassador of South Indian food legacy in NZ.