Foodhak

Source: Foodhak

Foodhak uses generative AI to come up with healthier recipes

Ayurvedic ready meal business Foodhak has acquired healthy meal delivery business The Pure Package and sister company Balance Box out of liquidation.

It follows a $5m (£3.8m) funding round secured last year by Foodhak founder Sakshi Chhabra Mittal, – a member of the Indian billionaire family dynasty – who launched the business at the start of 2022.

Pure Package was founded by Jennifer Irvine in 2003 to provide healthy, tailor-made diet meals to private clients in London, with the business serving the likes of Adele, Melanie C, Florence Welch, Kelly Holmes and Michael McIntyre.

It expanded nationwide with the launch of sister brand Balance Box in 2013.

Both business appointed liquidators earlier this month after struggling in the aftermath of the pandemic.

Foodhak is working to combine the businesses following the deal, merging recipes and customer databases.

“We think the businesses are aligned in their ethos and we wanted to step in to add value to the already successful Foodhak,” Mittal said.

“We want to merge assets and make Foodhak an even stronger proposition in the healthy eating space with technology and personalisation at the heart of everything we do.

“We will see the knowledge, expertise and skills of all three businesses combined to create something very special and even more valuable.”

Foodhak – the ‘hak’ part of which stands for Healthy Asian Kitchen – also announced its chefs had been designing meals using generative AI that the company claims can target specific diseases and deficiencies.

Mittal developed Foodhak after being diagnosed with a liver disease, which she claims to have beaten by transitioning to a vegan-based diet.

Subscribers to the business receive a weekly box with premium ready meals, created in consultation with medical experts, that are low GI, anti-inflammatory and free of alkaline, gluten, dairy and refined sugar.

“AI enables us to use evidential data sets with precision and to help us construct new recipes and products, with smart ingredient swaps to target health problems and improve wellbeing, accurately using food as medicine,” Mittal added.

“This revolutionary approach is unique and no one is utilising such huge swathes of data to improve nutrition and wellbeing.

“We can use this technology to recreate any meal, as indulgent as a pizza or a brownie, and tweak the recipes with smart ingredient swaps to make it delicious but add value to your health.”