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The standalone fine dine engineer

To shout that Rahul Akerkar introduced Mumbai to international standalone fine dining is to divert the man himself from the only subject he would prefer to dwell on rather than the accolades. Food. That's the only reason he chose to be a restaurateur, he tells Bhisham Mansukhani

If Mumbai's serious gourmands were interrupted between one of their sumptuous courses by the thought of a masters of biochemical engineering from across the Atlantic ushering the trend of standalone fine-dining, the environment may have been suffused with cynical burps. Circa 2005, none will own up to flouting that dining etiquette as that improbable has already transpired and stands quite literally in a posh Mumbai arts district.

The reason why the man who put it altogether is the unlikely achiever toes back to his rather delayed introduction to restaurating after his academic pursuit towards a career in bio-chemical engineering - as far flung from culinary art as one gets unless you consider fast food. In hindsight, Rahul Akerkar, the founder, executive chef and partner of Indigo, doesn't think he would have chosen any other route although until that moment of realisation it was anything but. So how did it all begin. A flashbulb idea or instant karma? Akerkar quips in hallmark matter of fact disposition, "I was broke, that's all. I was studying in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and would frequently dine and down martinis at this small French restaurant called Jethros before going off to play miniature golf. Eventually, I told the owner that I couldn't come back to dine if he didn't give me a job so he did." Akerkar entered the restaurant business as dishwasher and the salad ‘guy’ at the dinner-only Jethros. He soon became chef and trained under a Frenchman who worked part time at the restaurant and had a lineage that traced back to kitchen of the Czars.

Returning to New York City for his masters, Akerkar continued to work at nights at various Manhattan restaurants to pay his bills and support his passion and knowledge further. Then, confronted with the prospect of research in his discipline - something he was loathe to opt for, he embraced restauranting full time. With an eye on his own start-up, he also worked as a restaurant manager before returning to India in 1989.

"I knew I wanted to open a restaurant but didn't have the means or the expertise on how to raise it, just the ideas. When I came here, there was no real `gourmet scene'. Five star hotels held sway." In quintessential style, Rahul broke into the high-end private catering segment which created the ranks of followers of the precise profile that would patronise him in the future. The inevitable first project soon came about, on the back of the buzz that his private catering stint had created. Under The Over at Kemps Corner was all about value for money Western fare like Texas style barbeque, pizzas, sandwiches. It was this point that Akerkar observes his first major contribution to restaurating trends in Mumbai. "At that point, chefs weren't brands, let alone turning standalone restaurateurs. I was a dedicated chef but I wasn't strictly back of the house. I would interact with guests and take their opinion of the cooking as they ate. My approach to the whole business was different. Conventional restaurateurs, then, were just businessmen. While one doesn't have to be a chef to be a restaurateur, they have to see fine-dining as a culture rather than just about making money."

To cut to the chase, Akerkar sold his business to the premise owner when the lease ran out, shifted to Bangalore for another restaurant project but didn't appreciate the low consumption levels prevailing in the Southern city. The next two years saw Akerkar go from scouting for a restaurant location in Mumbai to almost opening one in San Francisco to going back to work in Manhattan restaurants. Fortunately for him and Mumbai, the erstwhile Vintage restaurant, which Akerkar was mindful of, went up for lease. The Akerkars closed the deal and set about a four crore facelift. So, 2000 was when Akerkar introduced Mumbai to Indigo. A contemporary ambience of restrained elegance, bare walls plain linen on the table, the message and the focus was about 'good food cooked well'. "Gutsy move but will it work," was a famous remark made by one hospitality doyen. When it opened, Indigo became the only restaurant where reservations were sold out two months in advance. "We had to turn away celebrities because there just wasn't any place. We were running packed for nine months. It was the inarguable cornerstone and food and beverage staff from many hotels dined here by the droves trying to figure out our service philosophy and modifying their training modules. It wasn't groundbreaking in the global sense. It was about bringing international restauranting home. We were not a specific restaurant and that is what gives Indigo such a wide appeal," Akerkar beamed.

It's 150-wine list way back when, resulting in recognition by the Wine Spectator becoming the first Indian restaurant to win the award. That Indigo has become a lifestyle icon, Akerkar is comfortable with, but food will always be central. "This is a restaurant and events are a side attraction which is fine. I believe that people go to a restaurant to eat and come back to eat," Akerkar asserts in a non- chalant tone neither feigning modesty nor waxing eloquence. His most telling revelation when catering to the Indian palate is that it loves flavour not spice. From facing revelations to creating one, Akerkar is far from done. With his current restaurant growing at 20 per cent and his second venture, Indigo Deli doing just as well, he isn't slowing down. A void of a hotel management degree and a history of violent stuttering didn't deter Akerkar from becoming India's inarguably first and most extroverted stand alone chef restaurateur. However did he manage it. There isn't one encompassing answer, he quips, "Just the sum of many details, just like signature Indigo dish!"