Avtar Singh Sandhu, a Jat Sikh from Punjab India came to the Bay Area for a graduate degree in engineering in the early sixties and also got his first exposure to wine and northern California's wine country. After graduating he left the area to take an engineering position back in India, designing nuclear facilities, but he remained passionate about the wine. His work would return him to the Bay Area again five years later, where he was able to continue learning about and enjoying the great wines of the local wineries in Sonoma County and Napa County. It was the engineering work that not only allowed him to straddle an existence between the two countries, but also gave him the resources to purchase his own Sonoma Valley vineyard, Sandhu Vineyards, in 1978.
While Sandhu knew little about viticulture, he felt that agriculture was something he was familiar with given that he came from generations of farmers. And so he pressed on with a methodical approach and common sense and ingratiated himself into the good graces of the surrounding local wineries and learned what he didn't know, by speaking with the locals. With his perfect English, inquisitive nature, and gregarious outgoing personality, he found everyone to be helpful. In short order Sandhu produced grapes and sold Sauvignon Blanc, Merlot, and Cabernet from his vineyards to surrounding winemakers. So growing grapes had proven to be something that indeed did come naturally to Sandhu. But growing grapes for others and producing your own wine are entirely separate pursuits, so it wasn't until five years later that he first decided to become a vintner himself, bottling his first private label under the name of Chateau Mushal, which references his village of origin in India.
With his constant workload between the two countries as he continued to work on engineering projects, he took advantage of his time in India to help introduce wine to a culture which was used to tea, whiskey, gin, and beer. As wine gradually gained acceptance in India, Sandu began to supply that market with his own label and has made a name for his wine, which can now be found in hotels and wine shops in Delhi and Punjab. In fact, while Sandhu has retired from engineering, his wine business has become so successful with his exports to India that his workload has not lightened in the least and he spends just as much time between the two countries as he did before, only now he travels for his passion, giving Indians a wine they can be proud of; their own piece of California's wine country.
