Meet Esther Motunrayo Akinola, the chief executive officer of Rehoboth Culinary Services who dumped her corporate job for Moi-moi making after a lot of initial hesitation.
By Eberechi Obinagwam
Meet Esther Motunrayo Akinola, the chief executive officer of Rehoboth Culinary Services who dumped her corporate job for Moi-moi making after a lot of initial hesitation.
A graduate of Office Technology and Management, Federal Polytechnic, Ede in Osun State, Esther once had a traditional 8 am to 4 pm job.
“I wasn’t pleased with the way some people under me were doing things, just because they were related to my boss. So, I stopped my 8-4 pm job,” she said.
The unfulfillment in the job made her seek career change. And with a passion for cooking, she decided to try something unthinkable – making of moi moi elewe. Moin-moin or moi-moi is a steamed or boiled bean pudding made from a mixture of washed and peeled beans and onions, fresh red peppers, spices, and often fish, eggs, and/or crayfish. Usually made of soaked beans ground into a fine paste, mixed with dried crayfish, vegetable oil, and seasonings, other garnishes as sardines, corned beef, sliced boiled eggs, can be added.
The bold efforts by Esther marked the beginning of her culinary journey, which eventually led to the formation of Rehoboth Culinary Services. Despite the challenges, she persevered and has since found success in her new venture.
Esther also attended The Chef Josh Culinary School in Ibadan, to get better in her skill.
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“Cooking has always been my thing. I started cooking as a little girl from my father’s house. Moi moi was just the one thing God needed to use to bring me out,” she said.
Today, Chef Rehoboth is a testament to the power of entrepreneurship especially when one follows his or her passion.
She not only makes delicious Moi Moi Elewe, but also makes healthy homemade meals and soups for people.
Esther is also an exporter who sources quality foodstuffs in Nigeria for people living abroad.
Trading corporate job for Moi Moi Elewe
“I had just left my 8-4 pm job, in 2018 and I was tired of staying at home doing nothing. I walked up to my uncle’s wife and told her to teach me how to wrap moi moi elewe, and she did. Then, I needed to get a space to sell. With her help, I got a space,” she said.
Not many were impressed that Esther, once a working-class lady found herself on the roadside with a cooler of moi moi elewe. It became a challenge she had to confront head-on.
“For the first week, as a graduate, decently dressed like I was going to the office, I would sit with my brown cooler filled with moi moi by the roadside without an umbrella from 7 am till 12 pm before someone later gave me a big umbrella.”
Challenges
She explained that her first challenge was fear.
“What if someone who knows me sees me seated by the roadside after all the education I had?” she would say to herself.
Esther had to encourage herself. “A few weeks later, I told myself I wasn’t going to stop. I had to let go of my timidity because, at a point, people with big rides were the ones coming to buy.”
“My moi moi at the beginning wasn’t the perfect look I would have wanted, but I did research, and I asked questions from different people. I asked old women in the market to teach me how to do it better.”
Another challenge she had was meeting up with customers at 7 am because most of her customers who were teachers left for work at that hour to beat traffic.
“My environment was not 100 percent secure. But I summoned courage, and by 3 am, I would get up to wash beans, and by 4 am, I would be out to blend it. I was not very fast in wrapping the moi moi in the traditional leaf. Waking up very early was the only solution I could think of,” she said.
Esther said she almost stepped on a snake on one of those days when she would rise early.
She also disclosed that finance was part of her challenge when she started. “I started from the little money I saved and the N20,000 given to me by my uncle,” she said.
The CEO of Rehoboth Culinary Services said businesses in Nigeria face instability in the prices of goods in the market.
“It’s hard to want to deliver the best in this present-day Nigeria, and not want to update your price list from time to time,” she said.
She also identified fears of getting good customers as part of the challenges business people in Nigeria face.
She advised businessmen and women in Nigeria to always provide a quality product as customers will always come back and most times recommend them to someone else.
“Think of value first as an entrepreneur. Value before profit. Build relationships with your customers beyond a business transaction. But you have to study individuals before you get too close. Positive-minded people who are honest to tell you which areas you are good at and the ones you need to work on. You’re good at something, and you can focus on that.”
Her views on Japa
She said people travel because they want a system that works, a system where they see results of input in their efforts.
Esther, said, she is still in Nigeria because she has to.