Rajat ("Raj") Parr is an

Indian-American Indian Americans or Indo-Americans are citizens of the United States with ancestry from India. The United States Census Bureau uses the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Native Americans, who have also historically been referred to ...

sommelier A sommelier ( or or ; ), or wine steward, is a trained and knowledgeable wine professional, normally working in fine restaurants, who specializes in all aspects of wine service as well as wine and food pairing. The role of the wine steward in hau ...

turned winemaker who oversaw the

Michael Mina Michael Mina ( ar, مايكل مينا; born 1969) is an American celebrity chef, restaurateur, and cookbook author. He is the founder of the Mina Group, a restaurant management company operating over 40 restaurants worldwide. He is the exec ...

restaurant group's wine program before launching his own wineries in

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

and the

Central Coast of California The Central Coast is an area of California, roughly spanning the coastal region between Point Mugu and Monterey Bay. It lies northwest of Los Angeles County and south of San Mateo and Santa Clara counties, and includes the rugged, undevelope ...

. Sandhi is his label of purchased grapes while Lompoc, Domaine de la Cote, and Evening Land are productions from his and Sashi Moorman's (his business partner) vineyards. He mainly produces

Pinot Noir Pinot Noir () is a red-wine grape variety of the species ''Vitis vinifera''. The name may also refer to wines created predominantly from pinot noir grapes. The name is derived from the French language, French words for ''pine'' and ''black.' ...

and

Chardonnay Chardonnay (, , ) is a green-skinned grape variety used in the production of white wine. The variety originated in the Burgundy wine region of eastern French wine, France, but is now grown wherever wine is produced, from English wine, Englan ...

, biodynamically and organically. His winemaking philosophy is based on little to no manipulation of the final product through never inoculating nor over-ripening. His latest project is an urban winemaking facility in DTLA that he shares with fellow winemaker Abe Schoener.

Early life and education

Parr was born and raised in

Calcutta, India Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, commer ...

.Molesworth, James, ''Wine Spectator'' (5 March 2007)
Sommelier Talk: Rajat Parr
/ref> He grew up close to his cousin, who ran two restaurants in

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...

.Jung, Carolyn, ''San Jose Mercury News'', (25 September 2002)
Meet The Sommeliers Who Are Changing The Profession
Although he had read about wine, he had never tasted it ( wine production and consumption in India is relatively limited) until age 20, in 1993, with an uncle living in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. Parr graduated from the Welcomgroup Graduate School of Hotel Administration in

Manipal Manipal is a suburb and university town within Udupi, in coastal Karnataka, India. Manipal is located five kilometres away from the centre of Udupi City, in Udupi District, Karnataka (state) in south western India. It is administered by the Udup ...

Karnataka Karnataka (; ISO: , , also known as Karunāḍu) is a state in the southwestern region of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act. Originally known as Mysore State , it was renamed ''Karnat ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. He graduated from the

Culinary Institute of America Culinary arts are the cuisine arts of food preparation, cooking and presentation of food, usually in the form of meals. People working in this field – especially in establishments such as restaurants – are commonly called chefs or ...

Hyde Park, New York Hyde Park is a town in Dutchess County, New York, United States, bordering the Hudson River north of Poughkeepsie. Within the town are the hamlets of Hyde Park, East Park, Staatsburg, and Haviland. Hyde Park is known as the hometown of Frankl ...

, intending to become a

chef A chef is a trained professional cook and tradesman who is proficient in all aspects of food preparation, often focusing on a particular cuisine. The word "chef" is derived from the term ''chef de cuisine'' (), the director or head of a kitche ...

and

extern In the C programming language, an external variable is a variable defined outside any function block. On the other hand, a local (automatic) variable is a variable defined inside a function block. Definition, declaration and the extern keywor ...

ed at the

Raffles Hotel Raffles Hotel is a British colonial-style luxury hotel in Singapore. It was established by Armenian hoteliers, the Sarkies Brothers, in 1887. The hotel was named after British statesman Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, the founder of modern S ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

Career

Parr moved to

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

to become a food runner at Rubicon Restaurant, on encouragement from his wine instructor, after reading a magazine article about the restaurant's celebrity-sommelier Larry Stone. Parr, who visited

vineyards A vineyard (; also ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines, grown mainly for winemaking, but also raisins, table grapes and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is known as viticulture. Vineyards ...

on his days off to learn more about wine, impressed Stone with his persistence and determination. Within six months he became assistant to Stone, who became his mentor. After three years, Parr became sommelier of the Fifth Floor in San Francisco in 1999. In 2003 Parr was appointed wine director all of the Michael Mina restaurants throughout the United States. In 2007 he, along with Michael Mina, were hired to develop and run a food and wine program by the developers of San Francisco's Millennium Tower, who called him "one of the most celebrated sommeliers in the world". The restaurant, RN74, had a $4.5 million budget and opened in May 2009 with an 84-page wine list. RN74 closed in October 2017. In October 2010, Parr in collaboration with Jordan Mackay published ''Secrets of the Sommeliers'', which won the 2011 James Beard Cookbook Award - Beverage Category.Adler, Sarah, ''San Francisco Chronicle'' (1 October 2010)
Wine masters spill secrets of sommeliers
Parr and Mackay later co-authored ''The Sommelier's Atlas of Taste: A Field Guide to the Great Wines of Europe'' (), released in October 2018.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Parr, Rajat Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Cuisine of the San Francisco Bay Area American sommeliers Culinary Institute of America Hyde Park alumni Indian emigrants to the United States Manipal Academy of Higher Education alumni American people of Indian descent American businesspeople

Early life and education

Career

See also

References