Page 20 - Food&Drink Magazine November-December 2021

✷ RISING STAR
FAR LEFT TO RIGHT: Ronin Culinary Labs founder Danny Ronin, and chef Elijah Holland, working together to make condiments that connect with consumers.
Side hustle success
COVID-19, a chance friendship and common goal has resulted in condiments and a community. Kim Berry talks to Danny Ronin and Elijah Holland about their successful side hustle, Ronin Culinary Labs.
From a few jars for family to using a ghost kitchen to turn out hundreds of jars per batch, the business is all online.
Ronin says they’re still trying to “find our fit” in terms of a business model. “At the moment we’re one hundred per cent digitally native and vertically integrated, and that has been important for the consumer experience. There are enough people using the internet for us to be fully based online,” he says.
Its subscription model means fans never run out while also building brand loyalty.
A CHANCE MEETING
Before COVID-19 arrived, Ronin was filming in Melbourne’s restaurant Lûmé and met head chef and chief forager, Elijah Holland. The restaurant’s philosophy is one of foraging, using the endemic and naturalised species found in the surrounds of Melbourne and Victoria.
For Ronin, connecting with Holland took everything to another level.
DANNY Ronin was a video producer, working with artists, musicians, and other clients on creative projects. And then COVID-19 arrived, stopping his work in its tracks. But in his downtime, Ronin had been making – and perfecting – his own chilli oil.
With each batch he would share jars with family and friends, reflecting his core values about radical gifting, being an active participant, and creating things.
“I’ve been going to Burning Man in the US for a while and have adopted some of
its principles as my own,” Ronin says.
The chilli oil has as much crunch as it does heat and spice. Made with onion, garlic, spring onions, chilli, soy, sesame, and peanuts it has a depth of flavour from mushroom powder, Sichuan peppercorns, cassia bark, ginger and star anise.
It is one of those condiments people become attached to and then use on everything, he says.
It was his own radical gifting at the local post office that shifted the chilli oil from something he was doing as a hobby into a business.
“I was sending jars off to some friends and had one left over, so I gave it to Arthur behind the desk. The next time I went in he
asked if he could buy ten jars and it has basically grown from there,” Ronin says.
From the outset, Ronin has run the business purely online and offered a subscription service. It ties into his active participant philosophy.
“This is about creating something where people aren’t just passive consumers. Our mantra is ‘the most important ingredient is you’, because without them the brand doesn’t exist. It is about their participation in buying it, using it, sharing their experience on social channels as well as with in person, and feeling like they are a part of something,” he says.
20 | Food&Drink business | November - December 2021 | www.foodanddrinkbusiness.com.au