Transcript
Harshit Gupta: The first time I saw chocolate being made, the kid out of me just jumped out. I was jumping with joy.
Elliott Curelop: The sky's kind of the limit when you're working with chocolate. Chocolate's, such a comforting, familiar canvas to showcase all these beautiful nuts and flowers and these really interesting combinations of flavors that you just don't see in the US.
Harshit Gupta: For us, it was important to change the focus and perception that the Swiss chocolate is what's supposed to be the good or the Belgian. They don't talk about where it came from. It grows in Central America, South America, in Southeast Asia and in Africa. It came from these countries which are basically marginalized communities. Chocolate is a medium which encompasses flavors from everywhere. To be connected to India in sourcing our cacao beans or when we get our spices from it just makes me feel that I'm able to give back to my country.
Elliott Curelop: We have a ton of flavors. We've got vanilla fennel, we also have rose pistachio. Our flagship flavor is Masala Chai, which is based on my mother-in-law's recipe.
Harshit Gupta: She loves Elli and he was the one. It's like, why not? We name the business Madhu. We were using her recipe. It just made total sense. This company should be named after her. I'm giving a soul of my family, and that's what I'm putting out in a form of a chocolate for you.
Elliott Curelop: When you are a small business, people want to get to know who you are. They want to know who the people behind it is. We wanted to make it very clear who we were.
Harshit Gupta: It's a cool thing walking on the street and people say, oh, I could recognize you are Madhu Chocolate boys.
Elliott Curelop: I have a hard time seeing our brand taking off the way it has had we started in any other city. People here, they're looking for something different, and I think that the people in Austin really love their community and they love to see small businesses flourish.
Harshit Gupta: In the business world, South Asian community is underrepresented and in that too South Asian gay community, that's very rare you will find it. I take a real pride that I'm able to represent my culture, represent myself, represent my people.
