Dec 20: Rupali Bhatnagar has been working with Sula Vineyards for over 11 years and is currently their General Manager and Senior Winemaker, responsible for making all the sparkling wines among other duties, and joins the Top Ten Women of wines in India(WOW) in the winemaking category, for the second time
Unless you visit the Tasting Room or SulaFest or Sula Vineyards, chances are you may not have even heard about Rupali Bhatnagar, a dedicated professional with proficiency in new wine development projects and wine related research projects which results in creation of new or improved wine products. This seasoned Winemaker with over 11 years of experience, from production to winemaking and managing cross-functional teams has been a very important person in the quality winemaking of Sula Vineyards.
The relatively quiet looking Rupali who turns 34 on December 29, created first Blanc de Noir sparkling of India- the Sula Tropicale Brut, widely accepted by Indian sparkling wine lovers. She has been working towards bringing the bubblies at Sula’s to champagne standards.
You may not have seen it yet but she is currently working on India’s first Sparkling Shiraz. She already blended successfully India’s first blanc de blanc (100% Chardonnay) in 2015-ostensibly the most expensive Indian sparkling wine-and available in limited quantities.
Specializing in the sparkling wines at Sula, she was instrumental in white and red wines blending, designing riddling and disgorging processes and sparkling winemaking. She has detailed knowledge of complete wine making process- from (Grape to Bottle) and has handled wine making processes for varietals like Sauvignon Blanc, Chenin Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Viognier, Roussanne, Riesling, Zinfandel (both Red and Rose), Pinot Nor, Ugni Blanc, Tempranillo and Chardonnay at Sula.
She is experienced in both the reductive and oxidative style of winemaking. She also facilitates Wine Tastings.
Starting her wine journey with Sula quickly rose to work her way up as an Assistant Oenologist in Sparkling wines in 2007 and has been General Manager and Senior Winemaker-Sparkling wines since April 20015. She might not have envisioned her wine journey when she graduated in Micro-biology in 2006 from the University of Mumbai but the WSET-2 that she did later, only enriched her wine experience.
She initiated the process that led to the production of Sula Vineyard’s Méthode Traditionelle (Champenoise) sparkling wine, having achieved 35,000 cases per year. She also spearheaded the Asti-Spumante method for making sparkling wines to produce 75,000 cases per year.
Rupali Bhatnagar joined the ranks of Top Ten Wow in 2015. We welcome her again in our 2017 edition of the 3rd biennial event, in the Winemaker category.
Subhash Arora
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