This month we focus on Eat Raja, India's first zero-waste fruit bar that serves its beverages directly out of the fruits' shells.
Eat Raja has been a popular juice bar since the 1980s. It is situated in Bengaluru in Southern India, which is the 3rd most populated city in India with a population of 8.5m people. This region generates approx. 500 000 tonnes of waste per day, a big part of which ends up in landfills.
After the original owner of Eat Raja passed away, his son, Anand Raaj, decided to tackle the issue of waste in the region. He gave up his career as a radio jockey and took over the bar whilst adjusting the business to become zero-waste.
The juices and milkshakes offered at Eat Raja come from a great variety of locally sourced fruits and vegetables: bananas, pineapples, watermelons, lemons, muskmelons, dragon fruits, grapefruits, pink guavas with chilli, cucumbers, and many more. Raaj was helped by the mothers of the local community to gather a range of original recipes.
However, the most original part of the business is probably the containers used to serve the beverages: fruit shells! After using the most delicious parts of its ingredients for the juices, Raaj reuses the remaining shells to serve the freshly made drinks. Coconut shells, banana peels, or even hollowed cucumbers are among the eco-friendly containers used by Raaj to serve his delicious beverages. The straws offered at Eat Raja are either metal or made out of rolled-up banana leaves.
“We don’t use cups, we don’t use straws, we don’t use any kind of plastic or paper, and we don’t give any kind of packaging as well. And that is what makes us unique” - Anand Raaj
For this juice bar, helping the local environment doesn't just stop with the drinks. This business also creates bio-enzyme cleaners using citruses, and all the remaining food scraps are either used to make compost or given as food to cows.
Article by:
Lena Fix
Editor in chief at The ComPost
Cover picture by:
Pexels
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