Middle, Kyoto (November 18th, 2023)

I was in Japan around my birthday and wanted to book a special meal for myself and my Mom. I was able to make a reservation on Pocket Concierge which required pre-payment. The location seemed nice and the cuisine was marked “innovative” but that’s all I knew!
While the website cautioned English speakers might not be available, we had no language issues from the moment we walked in and were brought upstairs to our seats. Most of our course descriptions came from one of the sous chefs, who is Swedish and spoke great English. The chef also came out to greet us and introduce himself!
Pic 1: no amuse but instead started with this snow crab, which just came into season, with roe
Pic 2: I’m pescatarian, this was the first course that was different for each of us. My course was squid layered with a smoked vegetable (forgot which one!) to mimic the sausage served in the meat version
Pic 3: simple boiled turnip to warm us for the remaining courses.
Pic 4: my favorite course! Mushroom and ‘tasty leaf” rolled together and covered in mushroom sauce.
Pics 5-6: stuffed mushroom with yellowtail (?) and a egg yolk sauce. The meat version was mushroom with raw wild bear. The raw mushroom wasn’t my favorite but the sauce was great.
Pic 7: stewed lettuce with whitefish (again forgot the type!) and a touch of wasabi
Pic 8: another favorite course: the meat version was with chicken, but I had roasted sunchokes with scallops, broccoli and a grape sauce.
Pic 9: warm rice porridge sweetened with sweet potato to transition us to dessert courses
Pic 10: pear compote over whiskey pudding
Pic 11: warm financier with herbal tea—perfect crunchy texture
The pacing was fine until the last course, we sat for at least 25 minutes waiting for our check BUT they had called a cab for us and it also seemed the chef was waiting for a break in his other courses (three other tables seated after us) to say good night. We took a picture with him and he proceeded to walk us outside and wait until our cab drove off to go back in. It was an AMAZING way to end the night and made us feel so taken care of.
It was only after our meal that I read he had won [Pellegrino Young Chef](https://www.sanpellegrinoyoungchefacademy.com/academy-stories/yasuhiro-fujio-s-pellegrino-young-chef-2018) award back in 2018. There’s no shortage of good food in Kyoto but I highly recommend this restaurant!

by Difficult_Barber_395