I work in a business district where there’s a rich plethora of street food choices and a gym. As I take public transport to work, I’d often pass the gym, staring in awe of the patrons’ motivation to maintain a healthy lifestyle. In today’s fast paced lifestyle, it can be difficult to keep a balanced routine of clean eating and working out. Fad diets work only on a short term period and people would usually pile the weight back on after.
Jason Lee would agree with me on that one. Having used to stand at 105kg, he’d also tried various ways of cutting down, even starvation. Through healthy living and working out, he eventually managed to lose around 30kg.
“I found it really hard to stay consistent with my fitness plan when I am on the move travelling for business,” Jason told Vulcan Post.
“I came to a point where I only trusted my own cooking, even the process of shopping for groceries became exhausting reading labels on everything,” reflected Jason. Healthy eating also became a chore for him as gatherings, holidays, weddings and celebrations felt like a mourning session instead as it started to interfere with his life.
Believing that healthy fast food choices are still scarce and wanting to enforce a long term lifestyle instead of a short term diet, Jason Lee rolled out Kurin. Jason and his fellow directors of Kurin shared a friendship as early as the age of 7, attended the same university in UK, and had similar goals to live a well-balanced lifestyle.
Targeting busy individuals who are consciously aware to make a healthy change, Kurin operates as an online health food delivery service, delivering to KL City Centre Area, Bangsar, and TTDI between 11.00am–2.00pm.
At first glance, Kurin’s menu seems to show that they are in the poke bowl game. However, describing it as more of a healthy fast food concept store, Jason sees Kurin as a pick ‘n’ go chain that offers healthy ingredients inspired by Hawaiian cuisine prepared daily. There are also plans to expand to sandwiches, bento boxes, more variety of salads, and hot soups.
For a limited time, they’re also rolling out sushi donuts.
The Raw Factor
Options like tofu that is cooked by a blowtorch instead of in a pan with oil are available too. Their marinated raw salmon is sourced from Norway and tuna from Indonesia, while locally grown greens makes up the salad factor of their menu.
Compared to other health food deliveries, Kurin’s ingredients are mostly raw so we had some questions about the food delivery process.
Addressing the challenges in delivering raw food, Jason explained that the delivery process has to involve all parties to play a role for food to arrive safely—and it also includes the customers themselves.
- Kitchen – All sashimi grade proteins are only prepared the ‘just-in-time’ way from filleting to dicing on the same morning of delivery.
- Riders – Kurin’s team actively educates their team of riders on the ways to handle and store raw food for delivery. This involves helping the riders understand the reasons behind their strict time management schedule, to discussing alternate routes together. These steps help to reduce the waiting time and to minimise food being on the road.
- Customers – Customers will receive a message on the estimated time of arrival, minimising the delay of both the riders’ waiting time and the next delivery.
Reaching Out To Society
Focusing on convenience and accessibility that mobility provides, Kurin wants food education to be accessible too. Using social media as a platform to educate, their Instagram account is filled with visuals of their food choices and informative facts.
But is society ready for the food bombs? To Jason, people are always ready for things that have been proven to be beneficial.
“Some go to the extent of inquiring the total calorie and macronutrient information of every dish before choosing, but there are some that are just curious about the taste,” said Jason.
“Most of us aren’t competitive bodybuilders after all. The goal of the majority is to feel and look better,” Jason pointed out. Pricing their food from as low as RM10, he believes one shouldn’t pay the price of an unhealthy lifestyle just because you cannot afford it.
With their upcoming brick and mortar outlet in NU Sentral launching tentatively in mid August, Jason wants to organise food events with brands that have the same health objective such as classes, facilities, sports days, workout events and sportswear outlets.
Would Kurin be a pioneer of raw food deliveries in Malaysia or fall astray in the saturated health food startups? While it is definitely too early to tell, the convenience that they offer via online delivery service does give them an advantage, for now.
Featured Image Credit: Kurin