From working for free in his first show, shutting restaurants during COVID-19 to restarting his career in the USA; MasterChef India's Ranveer Brar on his journey into the culinary world

In the recent podcast with Bharti Singh and Haarsh Limbachiyaa, MasterChef India's judge Ranveer Brar gets candid about his journey. The chef shared anecdotes from his childhood, his struggles in the USA, entering the showbiz world of cooking and more. Take a look at what Chef Ranveer had to say:

This style comes from Lucknow, meri paidaish parvarish Lucknow ki hai. We would go to Punjab only for the farms and pray. I have spent most of my life in Lucknow. I can bet that Lucknow's worst dishes are also better than any city's best dishes. The street food in Lucknow is much better than the ones you would find in hotels and restaurants.

I was in the USA when MasterChef and all were happening in India. I moved to the USA in 2003, have experienced that struggle there, restaurants bandh hogaye, sadak pe soye. But with time and hard work, I restarted my career and even opened 8 restaurants there with Shingara paaji. Then I came to India when my father fell ill. Everything changed, I found it interesting and decided to stay back in India.

There was one TV channel, they didn't have money and asked me if I could do it for free. I worked with them for free for 10 days and it was so hit that they got funded and did another show with me. I didn't even see the camera in the first show. The show's name was 'Breakfast Express', if you watch the first 6 episodes, I haven't looked at the camera even once. All I did was cook and instruct. But that turned out to be a hit.

I then began with the travel shows and I realised that I belonged there. After that, for any food show, I never had a director. In such shows, it is all about talking and having a fun conversation with the viewers while cooking and I enjoyed that thoroughly.

MasterChef India was my first show on National TV, I experienced such a huge scale for the first time. A huge crew and massive crowd, at first I felt the game was different but later things became normal. The chef needs to be very careful with their comments while tasting the dish.

I come from a joint family, 8 log the aur 6 bhainsein thi. We had 2 cows as well. Dadaji bought a house on the outskirts of Lucknow and 6 acres of land where we did farming and kept our cattle. So we grew up there, my father was quite intelligent. He was the gold medalist in IIT and then he studied in Kanpur and he joined HAL Lucknow. My father was a part of India's first ejection seats and landing gear core team.

We belonged to a family of farmers with a lot of land and cattle, so when I told them I wanted to be a chef, panga toh hona hi tha. But then they all understood. I cooked a lot during COVID-19, I was making all the dishes that they wanted to eat. Papaji eats a little as he has diet restrictions due to his health.

The hotel business is all about learning with time. Even my 30-35 hotels got shut. There was an entire chain of restaurants that got shut during Covid-19 two of mine got shut due to a fire in Kamla Mills. It is a part of life, I do get angry but you have to keep hustling. Restaurant's work has the lowest returns. Most restaurants shut down due to wrong motivation. You have to keep hustling every day for your restaurant.

Bharti and I had done a show 'I can do that' where she was so enthusiastic that she would do all the difficult stunts. I still remember there was a water stunt and she had kept Karwachauth fast that day. She wasn't even married, but still, she kept a fast for Haarsh. And that day she nailed it. I used to always go for the easier ones.