Owner, Chef
Rainer Becker
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Born 1962 in Mosel, Germany. Career : This past year (2007) has seen Rainer Becker & his business partner Arjun Waney launch a second Zuma site in Hong Kong, after the ongoing success of his London restaurant, which serves ground-breaking modern Japanese cuisine. German-born Becker learned his craft & picked up his business flair in some of the finest hotels & restaurants in Germany, as well as at Sydney’s Park Hyatt hotel, before moving to the Park Hyatt in Tokyo, where he worked for six years embracing the local cuisine & culture. A move to London with Hyatt saw him launch the Rib Room at the Hyatt Carlton Tower (now the Jumeirah Carlton Tower) before striking out on his own & opening Zuma in 2002. He followed this up two years later with the buzzy but less formal Roka on Charlotte Street. Becker gained experience at some of Germany’s top restaurants (including the Michelin-star Koenigshof in Munich and Goethehaus in Bensberg) before joining the Hyatt hotel group, where he worked for 14 years around the globe. From 1988 to 1991 he was chef de cuisine at the Hyatt Regency hotel in Cologne. He then moved to Australia to work as executive chef at the Park Hyatt hotel in Sydney. The next stop was Japan, where he was executive chef at the Park Hyatt at the Park Hyatt in Tokyo for six years. Becker moved to London in 1998 as executive chef of the Hyatt Carlton Tower, where he relaunched its Rib Room and Oyster Bar. After working as a consultant on Alan Yau’s Hakkasan restaurant, Becker went solo, opening Zuma in Knightsbridge in 2002, followed by Roka in Charlotte Street in the summer of 2004.
Awards Roka, too, is beginning to attract accolades. Becker picked up the Harpers and Moët Chef of the Year award for both Zuma and Roka in 2004, and Roka was named Oriental Restaurant of the Year in the 2005 Tio Pepe ITV London Restaurant Awards. |
Roka
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