Indian Street Food Launch Day Powered by Paint, Prayer, and Pandora Fails
KEY POINTS
- •In March, Chai Pani co-founder Molly Irani shared her opening day chaos involving a busted cash register and confused food runners.
- •Friend volunteers, covered in fresh paint, donned Chai Pani shirts to run order tickets after the printer failed completely.
- •At the last minute, Meherwan's mother insisted on a traditional Pooja ceremony, pausing everything despite the line outside.
On March opening day at Chai Pani, Molly Irani and husband Meherwan faced a hospitality perfect storm: a non-printing cash register ("won't print tickets any fucking place at all"), food runners cluelessly navigating dishes they couldn't pronounce, Ruby behind the bar Googling 'lime rickey recipe,' and a sound system limited to Pandora on a phone. Their solution? Their paint-spattered, unshaven friends staged an impromptu ticket-run relay while Meherwan's mother put the brakes on opening for a traditional Pooja ceremony, involving coconuts, bells, and a giant group hug—right as a line stretched impatiently outside. Ingenious jugaad and ancient blessings helped dodge total chaos and set the tone for what became a James Beard Award-winning love story in Indian street food.
Share the Story
When your high-tech cash register fails and your friends fresh from painting become ticket servers, you know it’s a restaurant opening like no other. Bonus: interruption by a sacred coconut smashing mid-crisis. Hospitality gold!
Launching a restaurant day-long survival challenge: Inventive ticket running by paint-spattered friends, a non-printing POS, and religious ceremonies in front of a waiting line. Netflix should pick this drama up.
Nothing screams 'small biz hustle' like running tickets by hand because your brand-new register refuses to cooperate and praying with coconuts before opening.
Source: Eater | Published: 2/9/2026 | Author: Mary Anne Porto
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