Chef
He had to pursue a completely different career when he was not admitted to medical school. He left India as a young man, clueless about how to cook even a simple potato curry but eventually went on to teach America how to prepare one of the world’s most complex cuisines.
FAMILY BACKGROUND
RR was born in Chidambaram, a small city in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. His mother was a homemaker. His father was an officer in the Indian navy.
RR was the youngest of six children. His oldest sister was a medical school graduate and resident in obstetrics and gynecology when their mother was pregnant with RR, and she helped deliver him.
CHILDHOOD
RR, who attended Jesuit schools in India, wanted to be a physician like his oldest sister but he was not admitted to any medical school.
EDUCATION – PART ONE
At Bombay University, RR earned a Bachelor of Science degree in chemistry. He also became proficient in reading and speaking six different languages.
SELF-ASSESSING HIS INTEREST LEADS TO A NEW CAREER PATH
Because RR was prevented – by failure to be admitted to medical school – from pursuing his first choice of career – medicine – and because he loved to eat, RR decided to pursue a career in hospitality.
“When I first got to this country, I was almost embarrassed about where I was from and the food we ate,” said RR. “After a while, I realized that my Indian culture was the ‘tool’ I could use to overcome feelings of inferiority.”
EDUCATION – PART TWO – DIFFERENT COUNTRY, DIFFERENT FOCUS
Having decided to learn how to prepare and educate others about food from his home country, RR enrolled in a university to pursue a hospitality degree.
UPDATING ORIGINAL RECIPES TO APPEAL TO A LARGER AUDIENCE
RR acknowledged the cookbooks of two Indian cooking ‘heavyweights’ but decided to revise many of them slightly as a bridge to attracting larger interest in Indian cooking by playing with ingredients – e.g., swapping feta for the Indian cheese paneer or replacing the crust of a pizza with naan.
In 2001, the Betty Crocker company had not been in the market to publish an Indian cookbook, but RR kept pressing an editor he knew at General Mills, Betty Crocker’s corporate parent, with headquarters where he was living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Betty Crocker company eventually let him cook a multicourse Indian lunch for a collection of executives and book publishers. It was a spectacular success. Afterwards, he asked the company executives, “Is Betty ready for Indian?”
They agreed to publish what RR wrote and the book went on to be a big hit.
The “Betty Crocker’s Indian Home Cooking” book was the first of his seven published books.
RR was asked to consult for restaurants around the U.S., taught countless workshops, led tours to India, created a line of frozen Indian meals for Target and instructed thousands of professional cooks at universities, museums, and companies, including Google.
A favorite professional activity of RR was helping individual cooks confidently tackle dishes like curries and biryanis, often using basic ingredients that are common in supermarkets.
“He was very kind to those of us who are not great cooks,” said the author Amy Tan, who befriended RR. “He knew if you made this all ‘authentic’ that it wouldn’t appeal to many people beyond those whose families had emigrated from India. He was all about love and sharing and being honest and genuine.”
CHALLENGE – CRITICS OF ANY CHANGE
RR’s approach to preparing food based on – but not totally following original recipes for – Indian food, put him at odds with cooks in the Indian diaspora (the spread of people from their original homeland). Some of them thought that RR was compromising recipes and drifting too far from traditional Indian food preparations.
RR noted the criticism, understood it but continued to do what he thought was best for expanding interest in enthusiasm for Indian cooking. “Why limit your appeal to a small group,” he thought. “I believe my ancestors would be more proud of my efforts to spread the wonders of our culture.”
RE-EXAMINING HISTORY
RR’s last book, “On the Curry Trail: Chasing the Flavor That Seduced the World in 50 Recipes” centers on curry powder, an ingredient that has introduced many non-Indians to the cuisine but remains controversial. In Western countries, many people define curry not as a saucy dish but as the taste that comes from a can of curry powder – which turns out to have been the invention of British colonialists who wanted an easy way to take the flavors of India home with them.
Learning the history of curry led RR to write the book. “We were pummeled by colonials for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years,” said RR. “So, I wanted to look at the diaspora of curry powders through the eyes of the colonials who invented it and the Indians who they sent around the world.”
USING YOUR BOOKS AS AN EXCUSE TO TRAVEL
RR’s friends agree he was a master at nurturing friendships, mixing just the right amount of caring, gossip and knowledge to endear him to friends in almost every state. Using his employment as a consultant to widespread restaurants and speaking engagements to promote his books, RR set up his travel schedules to stay in touch with friends across the country.
The tour schedule for one of his books, “Smashed, Mashed, Boiled and Baked – and Fried Too!” a book about his beloved potato, was 54 pages long.
“He had more tour stops than Mariah Carey,” said the V.P. of Marketing and publicity for his books’ publisher.
CHALLENGE – IMMIGRATION ISSUES
RR entered the U.S. as a young adult, on a temporary work permit but he continued to reside within the states while he pursued a legal path to U.S. citizenship.
His first destination in the U.S. was a small but well-regarded hospitality management program, which RR picked because it was the least expensive one he could find in America.
The hospitality career path had many roadblocks for RR. Eventually, with the help of a cookbook he wrote and a growing national name for his culinary talents, RR attained official residency through “The National Interest Waiver” which requires, among other qualifications, that the applicant demonstrate significant expertise or exceptional ability in his or her field.
CAREER SATISFACTION
One of RR’s books, “660 Curries: The Gateway to Indian Cooking” is an 800-page compendium that remains an essential reference.
RR won multiple awards for his teaching, books, and television work.
In one of his last interviews before he died, RR said, “I’ve been recognized (professionally). I’ve been fine with that. But the one legacy that I’m leaving behind is my relationships. It’s what I can hang my hat on.”
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This career story is based primarily on an obituary written by Kim Severson, published within The New York Times in April 2023 plus internet research, including Wikipedia.
