A footballer turned entrepreneur has launched a meal prep business with his younger brother. 

Former Chelsea youngster Jhai Dhillon and his brother Simmy are the siblings behind Rice N Spice, a meal preparation company based in Hitchin that caters for everyone from the office worker to famous sports people.

Jhai is one of the few British Asian footballers to receive a professional contract in England (whilst playing for Stevenage) but as the business improved he decided to focus on the latter.

He said, “I decided to play non-league football and invest more time into the business. Later I decided to make the decision to stop playing altogether to go "all in" on the business. 

“Since doing so, the business has taken off and is now self-sufficient, with 16 staff working under us.

“Since November, I have been able to go back to playing non-league football on a part-time basis. Things are picking up again in that regard too. I've managed to play 8 games and score 3 goals with no pre-season at all! “

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Dhillon’s clients include Premier League winners, public figures and Love Island stars, “Our clients will pre-order their meals for the week ahead by our order deadline which is Wednesday at 9pm,”  He told us.

“Those meals will then be delivered on a Sunday or a Monday, for our clients to use throughout the working week. 

“An example would be someone receiving 10 meals on a Sunday to use for lunch and dinner Monday through to Friday. The meals are precooked and arrived chilled, so just need to be microwaved. 

“The menu changes each week to keep things varied for our clients.”

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He said the meals aimed to be nutritious as well as healthy.

Jhai added, “We want our clients to not only eat healthily, but to also enjoy the journey they are on towards their health goals, which is why we place a big emphasis on the meals also tasting great!”. 

“We could just provide bland unseasoned chicken with plain rice and boiled broccoli, but clients wouldn’t stick to it and would be miserable eating that all week!” 

“All of our meals are hand made in Hitchin and go from raw ingredients to within clients’ fridges within 24 hours. Essentially we prepare meals as if we are preparing them for our own family.”

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Jhai said the company was looking to expand, “We would like to continue growing as we have done so far for over the past two and a half years.” 

“Nationwide delivery is also a target of ours, so we can help more people, rather than those only in our local area.”

The idea for the business began in 2017 in the student halls of Bristol University where Simmy studied economics.

“It took off really well with the students. At that point it was more of a healthy take-away. but Simmy said 'why don't you start this off at home?'

"At that point I was playing at Stevenage and I guess I felt like I wanted to do something else as well as play football. I wasn't enjoying football that much.

"I thought 'it's working well there, so lets just do it', so me and mum started the Hitchin branch and then we expanded to meal prep."

On football, the midfielder urged young players to make sure they took their opportunities at all levels, “Every time you play or train, your goal should be to have fun, if you’re enjoying it, good performances will follow naturally and anything can happen then.”

You can find out more about Rice n Spice on their Instagram page as well as their website.