Just remember these two phrases : 'eigo no menyu arimasu wa?' and 'osusume wa nandesuka?' which mean 'do you have an English menu?' and 'what do you recommend?' respectively.
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restaurants
Here's Niki Nakayama, chef-owner of LA kaiseki restaurant n/naka, plating a selection of poetic dishes from her 13-course tasting menu and intimately explaining what kaiseki means to her
I learned something fundamental about traveling after my experience at Tempura Matsu, and that is, if you're completely dependent on guidebooks or travel sites, you'll miss out on so much.
Rokurinsha's tsukemen is probably the most popular in Tokyo right now. If you've never tried tsukemen, it's a dipping ramen.
My sister and I didn't get to our AirBnB until 3 AM--we were starving. The only place open was a 7-11 down the street.
This was my second time here. It's closed down now, which is a shame, but I'm glad got to try it twice before it went away.
Nihonryori RyuGin, No. 33 on the San Pellogrino World's 50 Best Restaurants list, is headed by bad ass kaiseki chef Seiji Yamamoto.
I really respect David Chang, and the Momofuku brand, or more appropriately--empire--that he's built. His cookbook is one of the most approachable I've read, and is accessible to anyone even remotely interested in eating.
Joe's Shanghai was good! Not as good as Din Tai Fung, or Mei in Montreal (which is my favorite), but it's up there.
Ubuntu is closed now, but I never posted these pictures, so here you go.
When I heard the Chef de Cuisine of French Laundry, Corey Lee, left to open up his own restaurant in San Francisco, I was really excited. I think we all were; us cooks in the Bay Area, at least.
While the bar was preparing our drinks, we were served the dessert course, which was an assault on all the senses. Each one consisting of only one or two bites.
Minibar is absolutely the best dining experience I have ever had--easy. Both food and drink were unparalleled.
The second wave of courses was the desserts, some of the most whimsical culinary imaginings, plated and edible. If Willy Wonka was a pastry chef, he would have worked at Alinea.
pork belly | with thai distillation
A linea' is latin for 'pilcrow' which is that backwards 'P' used to indicate the beginning of a paragraph. But, in the Middle Ages, this symbol was used to indicate a new train of thought, and in the case of Chef Grant Achatz, a new concept of cuisine.
Achatz’s menu at Alinea offers some of the most radical ideas ever to hit the plate. You can see for yourself here. In my opinion, his presentation skills are rivaled only by El Bulli, which was rated the best restaurant in the world by Michelin…Alinea was ranked 10—that’s still pretty good.
Incidentally, during his first years at Alinea, Achatz was diagnosed with cancer that effected his tongue, preventing him from tasting his own food—a chef’s worst and most ironical nightmare. He eventually overcame it, but during his treatment, Achatz continued to work full-time and even developed new recipes, saying that the inability to taste forced him to think outside the box and create a dish through pure and mental conception.
I had the opportunity to eat at Alinea during my vacation in Chicago. We had the prix fixe menu which consisted of a whopping 14 courses, and it was unforgettable.
ROES. It was salty, sweet, very briny, but refreshing. It felt like I was eating something straight off the ocean floor.
PORK BELLY W/ THAI DISTILLATION. House-made Sriracha, cucumber-infused lettuce, and braised pork belly. But the real star of the show was the thai distillation. It had all the floral aroma of a thai bird chili with none of the heat.
white asparagus parfait | yogurt - arugula flowers - avocado
WHITE ASPARAGUS PARFAIT. Served in a cylinder that, when removed, dropped the entire parfait onto your plate. Very interesting textures happening here.
BLACK TRUFFLE EXPLOSION. Served on his famous 'anti-plate' One of the most flavorful spoonfuls of food I’ve ever had. It was a literal explosion of truffle juice condensed into a pasta cup.
WAYGU BEEF W/ POWDERED A1. Pretty much like eating beef-flavored butter—it was so soft. It was served with a simple, but ingenious potato-chip crusted potato puree. It also came with a cellophane packet of powdered A-1…which was honestly more gimmicky than tasty, but it did taste exactly like A-1.
The kicker was the black urn centerpiece, which was sitting on our table the whole time, but wasn't put into play until the steak course. Water was poured into the urn and barbecue-scented smoke began to waft toward and engulf our entire party. A great end to the savory courses.
Stay-tuned for the next post on desserts. In the meantime, watch this craziness.
www.culinary-workshop.com