Key takeaways

If you are going to start a new business alongside your main operation, make sure it’s something you’re passionate about.

If you can afford it, think about being your own landlord and then those lease reviews will be a thing of the past.

Foodie serial entrepreneur Michael Van de Elzen may be best known for his Muriwai cooking school, Good from Scratch, his food and wedding events, his cookbooks and his TV show, Eat Well for Less.

But he also manufactures a cast iron cookware range with business partner and engineer Carl Engel and it’s an important part of his overall enterprise.

Carl heard the TV chef talking about his love of cooking over a fire on Newstalk ZB almost ten years ago and introduced him to his business, Engel Fires. The two then put their complementary expertise together and launched EngelElzen. The manufacturing venture, owned 50/50 by Carl and his wife Jude, and by Michael and his wife Bee, is supplying retailers all over the country. The pans, made in Rangiora, are priced from $275 for skillets and $295 for the original pan and the business has just made lids for the pans which, when turned over, double as a grill or griddle..

Michael works closely with Carl on product design.

“I’ll say, “It would be great to have the pan look and feel like this.’ We’ll work together and Carl will then 3D print a pan before he builds it for casting.”

Chefs have long had cookware ranges, but Michael says: “A chef working with a talented engineer like Carl is really unique.”

Michael Van de Elzen’s core business

At the same time, the Van de Elzens are working hard on their farm-based Good from Scratch cooking school, the classes they do there, contributing around one third of the business revenue. Michael and Bee hold up to three functions a week.

Good from Scratch is not an everyday venue, which is how they like it. The couple hold a Supper Club once a month and on the first Saturday of the month, they have The Farm Shop, which is like a marketplace. Both are well attended by locals.

The couple's success comes down to the fact they work well as a team, says Michael.

“It’s always been the two of us, Bee and I. She’s front-of-house and always the driving force. She pays the bills and is always the grounded one. I’m the one who says, ‘Let’s go and build something new.’”

Owning their business premises gives them peace of mind

Another thing the foodie entrepreneur is grateful for is that they own their farm at Muriwai and the cooking school next door.

“I’ve had half a dozen businesses and this is our first one where we’re the landlords,” says Michael.

“When I’ve had a landlord, it’s always been in the back of my mind that in two or four years’ time, there will be a rental renewal,” he says.

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The manufacturing side of Michael Van de Elzen's foodie business