When Dr. Surinder Kumar was a child living in a small village in India, he watched his father battle Type 2 diabetes, constantly choosing between eating for necessity and eating for enjoyment.
Though eating the foods deemed necessary would create a longer, healthier life, the enjoyable foods were the very things that made life full of color and flavor, he says.
Dr. Kumar’s father constantly searched for the best diet, not knowing it would inspire his son to pursue filling the gap of taste and necessity for the dietary food community.
Dr. Kumar, who now lives in Flower Mound, recently founded TruEats with his son, Daven Kumar. The diabetic-friendly company creates baking mixes for brownies, pancakes and more, all with high-nutrition ingredients like almond flour, chickpea flour, moong dal flour, urad dal flour, and monkfruit extract. They are gluten, dairy and soy free, and have a low glycemic index.
“My dad had done so much for our family that I wanted to do something that he would benefit from,” Dr. Kumar says.
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Dr. Kumar began learning about food at the National Dairy Research Institute in India and later at Ohio State University before working for big brand name companies all across the United States.
From Quaker Oats to PepsiCo, Pizza Hut, Wrigley and more, Dr. Kumar stored up knowledge for the time he would create his own food company.
It was at FritoLay where he met Jim Wisniewski, a culinary scientist with the knowledge and resources to make Dr. Kumar’s mission of great-tasting nutritional food a reality.
“My friend had all of the knowledge of how to make it taste good and how to make it operational,” Dr. Kumar says. “Making sure the recipes are right.”
After spending decades in the food science industry, Wisniewski ran pizza companies and breweries, and is now the president of Culinary Focus and the Spice Guild, a culinary innovation center in Grand Prairie.
Wisniewski and Dr. Kumar combined their food industry experience to create the seemingly impossible: sweet, delectable treats with high nutritional content.
“You can make something gluten-free and solve that problem, but then you create more problems by adding carbohydrates, starches and sugars,” Wisniewski says. “Surinder took a different approach and solved the problem, but he also made it a more wholesome product, which is a difficult thing to do, but he did it.”
The TruEats mixes and even zero-calorie sweeteners were carefully crafted to pair nutrition and taste.
“We combined what consumers want — great taste — with what they really need, a good source of protein and fiber, no gluten, no sugar, and not a lot of fat, and also not genetically modified,” Dr. Kumar says.
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The team originally wanted to provide plant-based meat alternatives, but they shifted their focus to baking mixes when the COVID-19 pandemic began. Suddenly, people were home, with health at the forefront of their minds, and it inspired a different vision for TruEats.
“My son came to me and said, ‘Hey, with people being in the home, this is a terrific opportunity to provide them with good nutritious products that they can bake,” Dr. Kumar says.
Daven, Dr. Kumar’s son, has worked in food industry marketing for nearly two decades.
“I was born into the food industry,” Daven says as his father chuckles. “When I was born, he was working at Quaker Oats, and I was the guinea pig growing up.”
Dr. Kumar smiles as he recalls those memories with his son.
“It’s now become a legacy of his,” Daven says. “I was a guinea pig of his, my kids are now my guinea pigs.”
Now that Daven constantly comes home with TruEats birthday cakes and brownies for his kids to try, the family watches as the next Kumar generation shows signs of following in their footsteps.
“Now my grandson does exactly what Daven did growing up,” Dr. Kumar says. “This is an 8-year-old who wants to develop a product by combining different products, and he’s so passionate. Every time we get together, he makes his product. He loves that.”
Like grandfather, like father, like son.
TruEats products are now available directly to consumers on their website at trueats.com, but the company plans to bring the product to store shelves soon.
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March 24, 2021 at 12:11AM
https://www.dallasnews.com/food/2021/03/23/flower-mound-father-and-son-launch-vegan-gluten-free-baking-mixes-packed-with-nutrition/
Flower Mound father and son launch vegan, gluten-free baking mixes packed with nutrition - The Dallas Morning News
https://news.google.com/search?q=Flower&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
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