Cyrus Todiwala is the executive chef and owner of award winning Café Spice Namasté with wife Pervin.

Born and raised in Bombay, Cyrus Todiwala has been passionate about all things culinary since watching his mother cook when he was a boy. Despite his parents’ fears, Cyrus decided to pursue a career in catering and after catering college, he started working for the Taj Group where he rose to become executive chef of their hotels in Goa. There, he was able to practise the grand art of classical French cooking. In 1991, he accepted an offer to come to the UK to help run a small restaurant, Namasté, where he started to develop his reputation for using traditional techniques to carve out new sub-continental dishes with a European twist.

Today Café Spice Namasté is owned by Cyrus and his wife, helpmate and business partner, Pervin, who looks after Front of House and Operations. In 2000, Cyrus was awarded an MBE for his commitment to education and training, and in 2010 an OBE for his contribution to the catering industry. The business has expanded to include outdoor and events catering and food, including a sprightly range of sauces, pickles and chutney under the Mr Todiwala’s brand. Apart from his passion for cooking, Cyrus is also deeply committed to training and the environment, and is extremely proud of Café Spice Namasté’s Investors in People Champion status and their 2011 Sustainable Food Award from the Corporation of London.

“When they asked me to be an Ambassador for WorldSkills London 2011, I was delighted. Education, training and skills are the engines of personal, professional, socio-economic and cultural progress. I have always believed that each of us has the potential to make something of ourselves. Young people must know that inside them is a kernel of success and sometimes it's only by competing with others that we can experience the excellence we all have within us. And what better success can we achieve than becoming an inspiration to others? This is an ethos that my wife Pervin and I have held since our days in Bombay and Goa, and have reminded ourselves of every day, for the past 16 years, as we've run Café Spice Namasté  in a very competitive environment. My advice to young people today is to seek to identify, and then play to their strengths. WorldSkills encourages them to do just that.”