From a third child to a movement
How a career change and a new baby turned into a home for Sarawak's artists, cooks and community.
I stepped away from policy work with the United Nations Development Programme to focus on being a mother. Indah — armed with no restaurant experience, just a love of art and cooking — became my third child.
In the heart of Kuching's old town, Trudy opened Indah's doors in 2014 as a small art gallery cafe — a canvas for local creativity as much as a place to eat. Sarawak artists and artisans used its walls and shelves to show and sell work they couldn't easily place elsewhere.
Encouraged by the visitors who kept returning, she began teaching what she knew best: cooking. What started as an informal invitation into her kitchen grew into Indah's now-signature cooking classes, built around a walk through the local farmers' market before anyone picks up a knife.
Over the following decade, Indah grew from one small cafe into a cafe, a bakery and catering kitchen, an event space, and a cooking school — all still rooted in the same idea: that food and art are the easiest way to introduce people to Sarawak, and to each other.
Indah opens as a one-room art gallery cafe on Kuching's Upper China Street, giving local artists a place to sell their work alongside coffee and cake.
The cafe grows into a full F&B and catering business, supplying cakes to other cafes and venues around Kuching, and launches Sarawak-style cooking classes and private local trips.
Visitors keep asking to bring Indah's gula apong granola, tempe and sambal home with them — so Indah Foods begins turning cafe favourites into ready-to-eat packs.
Indah Foods makes its export debut at FHA Singapore in April, invited by STATOS — the first trip outside Malaysia for two of the women on Team Indah who came along.
Indah is recognised as a social enterprise in November, formalising its work training Sarawakian women from B40 (low-income) communities for careers in hospitality and F&B.
A cafe, a bakery, a cooking school, an events space, corporate catering, and seven Indah Foods products for retail and export — still women-led, still community-first.
