A memorable kaiseki dining experience at Kintsugi KL
A memorable kaiseki dining experience at Kintsugi KL
By KY Speaks, Free Malaysia Today 28 Apr 2023
This luxurious restaurant in Isetan MidValley Gardens Mall is helmed by Michelin-starred chef Jeff Okada Ramsey, who promises a night you won’t soon forget.
Recently, this writer was invited for a tasting session at Kintsugi, one of the latest kaiseki restaurants in Kuala Lumpur. For those who are unfamiliar, kaiseki is a prescribed set of dining courses based on seasonal produce – not to be confused with omakase, which is when the chef alters the courses based on diners’ reactions.
Kintsugi Kuala Lumpur is situated at Isetan MidValley Gardens Mall and helmed by Michelin-starred chef Jeff Okada Ramsey. The name Kintsugi refers to the centuries-old Japanese craft of golden joinery – repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered precious metals.
The house-brewed doburoku, a cloudy sake made by chef Okada himself, was a great way to prepare one’s taste buds for the food to come.
Up first were seafood appetisers: Kinmedai Nanbanzuke (golden-eye snapper) with black pepper, a bite-sized offering not dissimilar to amuse-bouche, with a balanced taste fragrant with seasoning that didn’t overpower the fish.
This was paired with Soy Braised Ankimo with salmon and pickled plum – another delightful offering. Monkfish liver is often called foie gras of the sea, and the taste of this dish certainly backed up this claim.
No Japanese meal is complete without raw fish, and the special menu did not disappoint in this regard, serving up three types of premium seasonal sashimi: two-week-aged Nagasaki chutoro (tuna belly), one-week-aged grouper, and Shima ebi (grey prawn).
These were delicious and decadent, with the prawn on the sweeter side and the tuna belly creamy and most satisfying. The chef also offered homemade tuna jerky, a treat you’d wish you could buy at the supermarket!
The Fugu Shirako Agedashi was perhaps the most impressive dish of the evening. Not everyone enjoys shirako – for the uninitiated, fish semen! – as it tends to be too creamy or sticky.
The brilliance of chef Okada in using this delicacy as a tofu substitute in this dish can’t be overstated: smooth, elegant, and surprising in every which way.
Then there’s the Roast A5 Wagyu Tenderloin with asparagus. A great cut of meat properly cooked is always an experience to be treasured, and this is no exception.
Up next were three types of seasonal sushi, which included three-day-aged black-throat sea perch served in a fancy glass, and Ogawa uni (sea urchin) wrapped in seafood. One word: luxurious.
The final dish proper was Matsuba Crab Donabe Gohan, a showcase of chef’s ability to transform a simple rice dish into a culinary masterpiece. The crab meat was packed with rich seafood sweetness, well balanced by the Nameko mushroom soup served alongside.
As a palate cleanser after all the savoury delights, Matcha & Yuzu Entremet was a sweet and fitting conclusion to the night.
All in all, chef Okada pushes the boundaries just enough to make it exciting while not abandoning the traditional values of a good kaiseki dining experience, culminating in a memorable night out fitting for those who wish to treat themselves to a great Japanese meal.
Wonderful Japanese fare by a Michelin-starred chef
Wonderful Japanese fare by a Michelin-starred chef
By Abirami Durai, The Star, Sunday, 09 Apr 2023
It may be hard to believe but hidden on the third floor of department store Isetan in The Gardens Mall in Mid Valley, Kuala Lumpur may quite possibly be one of the city’s best fine-dining Japanese kaiseki experiences.
To get to the restaurant, you’ll literally have to walk through the department store. It’s an odd juxtaposition, but the meal that awaits is more than worth this slight anomaly.
The restaurant – named Kintsugi – after the Japanese art of restoring broken ceramics with gold lacquer – is a progressive kaiseki and sushi kaiseki restaurant.
The brainchild of the Clearwater Group, the eatery is helmed by none other than chef Jeff Okada Ramsey, who first earned a Michelin star as the executive chef of the Tapas Molecular Bar at the Mandarin Oriental Tokyo.
Ramsey also has some serious culinary pedigree, having trained under chef Masayoshi Kazato, the official sushi ambassador of Japan as well as the revered Spanish chef Jose Andres. His Malaysian eateries include Japas by Jeff Ramsey, which has been hugely popular since its inception.
“Kintsugi is a culmination of my experiences, innovated with the utmost respect to the fundamentals of Japanese cuisine and sushi. This is my passion project,” says Ramsey.
The restaurant is stylish and cosmopolitan and has 12 seats at the kaiseki counter and 18 seats in the dining hall, giving it an extremely exclusive feel. Produce is sourced from western Japan, where Ramsey’s maternal family and his wife hail from.
The menu starts at RM228 for lunch and goes up to RM698 for dinner. For something in between, you might want to look at trying the Kappo Ito dinner menu (RM498) which offers eight different courses, divided into sakizuke (appetiser), hassun (second course), mukozuke (a sliced dish of seasonal sashimi), agemono (deep-fried dishes), yakimono (flame-grilled food), ozara (meat course), gohanmono (a rice dish) and mizumono (seasonal dessert).
So what is kaiseki? Kaiseki is a traditional Japanese multi-course dinner, which bears some resemblance to the Western degustation dinner. The focus of the meal is on using the freshest ingredients and bringing out the best flavours, with taste, texture and appearance of the food also forming the bedrock of this meal.
At Kintsugi, the meal starts off with an appetiser in the form of doburoku, which is essentially an unrefined sake made with koji rice.
“This is actually very old style sake. The first sake invented by monks in Tokyo was 850 years ago and we use their method. It is very close to the method used to make the premium sake, and utilises water, rice, koji and yeast,” explains Ramsey.
The result is a beverage that has traces of rice-rich flavours in each sip, with an alcoholic quality that is pleasant but not overwhelming – basically the perfect opener to the meal.
Other highlights on the menu include sliced sashimi dishes, in this instance Japanese grouper, chutoro (medium fatty tuna) from Nagasaki and shima ebi (prawn) from Hokkaido. The grouper is a velvet wonder that is soft, fresh and like satin on the palate while the prawn has a natural sweetness and is very, very fresh. The tuna meanwhile is sensational – the fat melts like butter in the mouth and tastes like an opulent indulgence fit for royalty.
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The deep-fried item on offer is the fugu shirako agedashi. The fugu is of course the notorious pufferfish, which can be extremely poisonous for humans and requires special preparation. In this instance, the particular part of the fugu that has been used is the shirako (essentially the male fish genitalia containing sperm), which is particularly prized for its creaminess.
Here, the deep-fried shirako boasts a perfectly crispy carapace which yields to silken smooth fish sperm inside. It’s a textural odyssey similar to that of tofu but with far more creamy qualities bolstering its addictive value.
The ozara or meat course is a carnivorous triumph that features roast A5 Miyazaki wagyu tenderloin cooked medium rare with black truffles on top, fried burdock chips, seasonal asparagus, watermelon squash marinated in leftover sake lees for six months and finally, a bowl of egg yolk cooked with truffle oil, which is meant to be a rich, gummy sauce to accompany the beef.
The beef is truly sublime. Each slice reveals a slight outer crust which yields to meat that is perfectly pink, succulent and so melt-in-the-mouth tender, it is the gastronomic equivalent of chewing on spun silk. And the egg sauce is a true revelation – thick, gooey and the perfect counterpart to the meat.
The rice course is comfort at its best and serves up adult male Matsuba snow crab (which apparently has sweeter flesh) cooked with rice in an earthenware pot. This is served with a red miso soup, fashioned out of shima ebi (prawn) shells and honey cap mushrooms. The dish is incredibly flavourful and is packed with sweet tufts of crab meat that enhance each mouthful with a sublime aquatic quality.
For dessert, the matcha and yuzu entremets hit all the right spots. While matcha is often a love-it-or-hate-it ingredient, in this iteration the bitterness of the matcha pairs beautifully with the tangy, acerbic qualities of the yuzu in what proves to be a sweet treat that offers nothing but pure joy.
Under Ramsey’s capable stewardship, a meal at Kintsugi offers surprises, unexpected twists and turns and the sheer pleasure of eating morsels of food that continue to remain entrenched in your memory long after the meal is over. In other words, this is a restaurant to remember.
Source:
https://www.thestar.com.my/food/eating-out/2023/04/09/wonderful-japanese-fare-by-a-michelin-starred-chef
KINTSUGI Kuala Lumpur 城中怀石料理新据点
KINTSUGI Kuala Lumpur 城中怀石料理新据点
By Tiffany Tan, Icon, Sunday, 28 Feb 2023
KINTSUGI Kuala Lumpur 由 Clearwater Group 与东京米其林星级主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 联合开设，为食客带来一场无限惊喜与满足的怀石料理体验。
KINTSUGI Kuala Lumpur 是一家结合传统与创新的怀石料理（Kaiseki）和寿司怀石料理（Sushi Kaiseki）餐厅，由房地产集团 Clearwater Group 与东京米其林星级主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 联合开设，坐落于 The Gardens Mall 购物广场。
怀石料理（Kaiseki）指的是什么？Kaiseki 原意为在日本茶道中，主人请客人品尝的饭菜，现在已不局限在茶道上，更成为日本常见的高档料理。Kaiseki 讲求极端精致，不论餐具或食物的摆盘，甚至盛装食物的器具都十分讲究。
KINTSUGI Kuala Lumpur 让食客在喧闹的城市中，寻觅一丝清幽。欢迎来体验一场结合视觉与味觉的怀石料理享受。
“KINTSUGI” 取名自具有数百年历史的“金细工”，这是一种用金漆修复破损陶瓷的日本艺术。走进餐厅，从室内装潢及陈列架上摆放的陶瓷都不难发现“金细工”的足迹，主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 分享，修复的 “Kintsugi” 陶器是美丽的，因为破损和修复是陶器历史的一部分，为了秉承日本怀石料理用爱和尊重对待最好季节性食材的精神，他希望食客能学会欣赏日本人珍视在不完美中发现美的价值观。
这家餐厅“藏匿”在 The Gardens Mall Isetan，室内装潢简约低调，每一处装饰都突显其摩登质感。餐厅分为两个区域，设有 12 个座位的怀石料理柜台、18 个座位的餐厅及 3 个包厢，环境清雅，给予食客在幽静的氛围下细品精致的怀石料理。
这家餐厅体现了主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 的烹饪技巧，提升了传统的日本美食体验，同时也融入了他在过去 8 年旅居东南亚的烹饪之旅中所收集的独特风味。每一道菜单经过精心制作，向金继哲学和怀石料理传统致敬，在突破界限的同时，从品味和审美角度来看，它仍然保持着日式风格。
日前，《ICON 风华》受邀出席品尝由主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 亲自准备的怀石料理，每一道料理都带来味觉上的满足，惊喜不断！
首先，先付（Sakizuke）是主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 自酿的“米粥酒”（Doboroku），需经过发酵大约 5 到 7 天才能品尝；八寸（Hassun）是一道腌制黑胡椒的金目鲷，盛装在方形玻璃盘子；另一道八寸是鮟鱇鱼肝搭配三文鱼汤胶，入口鲜嫩。
首先，先付（Sakizuke）是主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 自酿的“米粥酒”（Doboroku），需经过发酵大约 5 到 7 天才能品尝；八寸（Hassun）是一道腌制黑胡椒的金目鲷，盛装在方形玻璃盘子；另一道八寸是鮟鱇鱼肝搭配三文鱼汤胶，入口鲜嫩。
炸物（Agemono）是一道河豚白子，白子是鱼类的精巢，其外皮香脆清爽，口感绵密细腻，宛如奶油般柔软细滑。
炸物（Agemono）是一道河豚白子，白子是鱼类的精巢，其外皮香脆清爽，口感绵密细腻，宛如奶油般柔软细滑。
大皿（Ozara）是一道烤 A5 和牛，肉色鲜红的 A5 和牛切块厚度恰好，入口即化且不油腻，可搭配松露蛋黄、芦笋及炸牛蒡配菜。
御饭物（Gohanmono）是香喷喷的秋叶蟹煲饭，肉质滑嫩，口味鲜甜，搭配滑子菇味增汤。
另一道御饭物（Gohanmono）是 3 款季节性寿司，包括鲭鱼、蓝虾及海胆。
最后一道水物（Mizumono）即是甜品，柚子抹茶甜品带有丰富层次的口感，柚子的清新果香味与抹茶搭配，口感十分契合。每一道料理都值得食客细细品味！
谁是 Jeff Okada Ramsey？
东京米其林星级主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 是一名日裔美国人，他曾在吉隆坡携手 Clearwater Group 开设 Babe by Jeff Ramsey 和 Japas 餐厅，成为 2016 年首位在马来西亚开设餐厅的米其林星级主厨。
他 32 岁成为米其林星级主厨，从日本官方寿司大使 Masayoshi Kazato 及西班牙 El Bulli 的传奇主厨 Ferran Adria 的门生主厨 Jose Andres 指导下获得烹饪技法。随后，他获得日本超级名厨 Hide Yamamoto 的邀请，成为为东京文华东方酒店 Tapas Molecular Bar 的行政总厨，而最近他荣获 Iron Chef Thailand 2022 最佳挑战厨师。
主厨 Jeff Okada Ramsey 精湛的厨技和他对创意料理的精益求精，肯定能为食客带来充满惊喜与满足的怀石料理。