Around Town: Inside Matunga’s 80-year-old Anand Bhavan, where people matter more than profit

Madhav left Donderangady in 1919 at the age of 12. He first worked in a military kitchen in Pune before moving to Bombay, where he began at the mori, washing utensils, and slowly worked his way up.

“But things weren’t working in his favour,” Haridas recalled. “So he visited Nityananda Swamiji in Ganeshpuri, near Vajreshwari (about 80 kms from Mumbai). He was unsettled. Before my father could even speak, the swamiji told him that there was a shop near his house that he would soon get.”

Crispy Benne dosa, special Ulundu dosa with podi and idli at Anand Bhavan. Express Photo by Amit Chakravarty

At the time, the family lived in a 250-sq-ft one-room kitchen where Haridas’s mother cooked for 15 people on a kerosene stove. A Gujarati restaurant called Anandi Bhavan operated nearby, serving misal and vada pav. “My father took it over, removed the ‘i’ to make it Anand Bhavan, and began serving pure South Indian food.”

The initial menu featured idli, vada, sheera, dosa and uttapam. One of their enduring specialities is ulundu dosa, made entirely from urad dal. Haridas recalls how the dish became permanent. His father wanted to build a mezzanine floor and needed municipal permission. “Mayor M Madhavan was a close friend and a regular here. My father told him his plan. The mayor said, submit the proposal, if everything is in place, you’ll get permission. But when it’s done, I will bring my corporators and you must serve something homemade.”

Madhav prepared ulundu dosa. It impressed the mayor and stayed on the menu.

Maintaining quality and taste

Haridas joined the eatery at 17, when his father began withdrawing into a more meditative life. A man who often answers questions with questions, he asked this writer: “Do you know the difference between running a Chinese and a South Indian one?”

When prompted, he replied: “I need four times the staff to run a South Indian restaurant. In Chinese cuisine, many sauces and ingredients are store-bought. Here, everything is prepared fresh.”

He is particular about definitions. “Quality is not equal to taste. Freshness is not equal to hot,” he said, adding that his father’s guiding principle was simple: “Cook as if you are cooking for your family.”

The no-frills, 66-seater restaurant spans 2,200 sq ft and features shared tables, wooden menu board, quick turnovers and barely any decor. The focus here is solely on food. Express Photo by Amit Chakravarty

“I can give you a hot idli, but it may not be fresh. Here, I want to give you both—hot and fresh.” Quality, he insists, comes from good raw materials. Taste comes from the love with which the food is prepared.

It is also why Anand Bhavan has remained a single outlet. “You cannot rely entirely on staff. We have to gauge the day’s turnout and decide how much batter to prepare in advance. We cannot deep-freeze it and use it for days,” he said.

The no-frills, 66-seater restaurant spans 2,200 sq ft, and features shared tables, a wooden menu board, quick turnovers, and barely any decor. The focus here is solely on food. We learn later from his son, Preetesh, that over the decades, its food has been enjoyed by the late Shashi Kapoor; his brothers Rajiv and Randhir Kapoor continue to visit. Amol Palekar, former cricketer Sanjay Bangar, industrialists Uday Kotak and Sajjan Jindal have all dined here.

But celebrity patronage is not what matters most to Haridas. “About 30 per cent of my customers come multiple times a day. Many others come several times a week. Their health is important to me. The focus is on food, not ambience,” he said.

At 70, he is at the restaurant every day at 9.30 am. He takes a break at 1 pm and returns at 6.30 pm until closing.

“Children have weekends off. Any businessman in this line would be foolish to shut on those days. So who are you earning for?” he asked rhetorically, his eyes welling up. “For me, it is seva. Around 20–30 per cent of Matunga’s residents are bachelors who depend on us for their meals. I could start a more profitable business. But I feel attached to them.”

He takes pride in using only groundnut oil and ghee, avoiding preservatives altogether. When once approached about extending shelf life, he had a ready response: “I don’t want to increase the shelf life of my product. I want to increase the life of my customers.”

The road ahead

Preetesh, 44, entered the business in 2010 after his grandmother passed away and his grandfather fell ill, requiring Haridas to divide his time.

Over the years, Preetesh has added items such as crispy benne dosa, neer dosa with stew, phirni, and bullet coffee. While he is invested in the business, always excited to try new dishes and see how they can be added to their menu and has even made changes like adding very aesthetic-forward brass coffee tumblers, he is not very inclined to run it for long.

“I don’t see myself continuing this forever,” he said. “The effort-to-reward ratio is skewed. I value my time off. I don’t see myself spending 10-12 hours every day and giving up weekends.” Preetesh now runs the restaurant from 1 pm to 6.30 pm while his father rests. “I had thought of closing it after the pandemic. But my father enjoys it too much. I will run it as long as he wants to.”