A pioneer in popularising Japanese cuisine in the capital, master chef Nariyoshi Nakamura is continuing to tempt diners with his signature dishes at Pan Asian, WelcomHotel Sheraton New Delhi Pix by Jagan Negi

With a flourish, chef Yutaka Saito delivers pre-heated lava stones to your table — they’ve been brought from the iconic Mt. Fuji itself — along with a variety of bite-sized pieces of raw meat. What you are about to tuck into is called Ishiyaki, or Japanese hot stone cooking, and you get to do this cooking yourself by placing the meat over the burning stones and watching it sizzle before your eyes. Don’t worry, Saito, head chef, MEGU, the newest addition to Delhi’s uber-fancy Japanese restaurants, and his assistants will be there to help you create this dramatic dining experience.

If you’re in the mood for some food gymnastics, then cut across to threesixtyone° at The Oberoi Gurgaon. Behind the Teppanyaki grill, chef John Mark dexterously slices fresh vegetables while juicy, steaming meats grill. It’s culinary theatrical showmanship at its best as he tosses and juggles his spatulas and knives while flipping the food. His specialities? Lobster with sweet chilli spicy sauce with tahini and flaming beef with garlic chips on French baguettes.

Japanese fine dining restaurants have become the flavour of the season and are steadily cruising up the foodie charts. Upscale and trendy Japanese restaurants are high on authentic and avant-garde ingredients, new cooking techniques and unconventional sauces to suit different palates.

The fact that it’s seriously expensive dining averaging between Rs 8,000 to Rs 10,000 (and counting) for a meal for two, isn’t playing dampener. The global Indian is abandoning his knife and fork for chopsticks, say the chefs.

So, does that mean that we’ve gotten over our phobia of ‘kachchi machchli’ or raw fish? Says Ananchai Suttison, Japanese master chef at Zen, The Park, Calcutta. “Japanese cuisine is looked upon as haute cuisine and is fashionable to boot. Though Indians aren’t completely over their hesitation about raw fish but they’re slowly getting there.”

Adds Japanese master chef Nariyoshi Nakamura: “Japanese cuisine is perceived as healthy and light as the ingredients are cooked in their own flavours rather than in marinades.”

Nakamura, a wizard in the kitchen, set the Japanese cuisine juggernaut rolling nearly a decade ago when he took over at Sakura, the traditional Japanese restaurant at Hotel Nikko, Delhi — now rechristened The Metropolitan Hotel & Spa aka The Met. He surprised Delhi diners with a multiple choice of sushi and sashimi.

Master chef Ananchai Suttison of Zen at The Park, Calcutta, believes that Indians are now gradually getting over their reservations about raw fish in Japanese cuisine

Today, he’s shifted base to the Japanese live kitchen at Pan Asian, WelcomHotel Sheraton New Delhi, and is dishing out his signature dishes like Yakimono — sautéed crispy chicken and Japanese pepper with soya citrus sauce.

Sakura today is headed by Japanese master chef Tetsu Akahira, who says: “Japanese cuisine has always been an enigma wrapped in layers of mystery — the more you uncover, the more there’s waiting to be discovered.’’

The fact is that some of the best known international Japanese restaurants now have India in their sights. New York-based MEGU has brought its Big Apple legacy to The Leela Palace Kempinski in Delhi, while Wasabi by Morimoto is doing brisk business at The Taj Mahal hotels in Delhi and Mumbai. The legendary chef Masaharu Morimoto drops in every few months to check on things.

Besides full-fledged international Japanese restaurants, top-notch hotels are offering live sushi bars and live Japanese stations/kitchens as well as Teppanyaki grills. The all-open kitchens with their white marble Japanese bar counters are perfect ‘cooking theatres’.

Chef Augusto O. Cabrera is a star at threesixty°, The Oberoi Delhi, for his expertise in combining traditional Japanese and modern sushi recipes

At some hotels, you have a strong Japanese section included in their regular multi-cuisine menus — like the San Qi at Four Seasons Hotel Mumbai.

Crucially, there are chefs like Tetsu Akahira who are keeping it totally traditional. There are also others who are contemporising the cuisine by keeping the soul traditional but the presentation dynamic and Continental.

No expense has been spared to make sure that the ambience has the right flavour too. The restaurants blend ultra modern designs with ancient Japanese accents — maintaining a fine balance between tradition and modernity, just like in their menus. At MEGU, for instance, a crystal Buddha and mammoth Japanese Bonsho bell suspended from the ceiling are attention-grabbers. Edo — the Japanese restaurant at ITC Gardenia, Bangalore — has been designed by Super Potato, a Japanese firm that specialises in restaurant design, like a modern stone garden.

Sakura has window blinds that are deliberately designed to resemble interior accents that are common features in Japanese homes while Zen is all about a colour palette of black, bronze, cream, gold and a few vivid green accents inspired by Zen simplicity.

So what’s cooking?

Chef Yutaka Saito of MEGU at The Leela Palace Kempinski in Delhi intrigues his guests with traditional Japanese cooking methods like Sumibi Aburiyaki and Toban Yaki

Once Japanese food was only about sushi, sashimi and Teppanyaki. Today, chefs at these upmarket eateries are grabbing attention with a combination of New Age cooking techniques and exotic, hitherto unheard of, ingredients. Wasabi, the Japanese horseradish used as a condiment for sashimi and sushi, is being served other than in its most famous green paste form. Chefs are now finely grating the wasabi root — over a specially designed grater — at your table, to be consumed fresh.

Wasabi by Morimoto is using all sorts of exotic ingredients. Ankur Chawla, restaurant manager, says that Yamamomo is a Japanese mountain peach that acts like a palate cleanser in the dishes. “We also use it in the Saketini — a popular cocktail — instead of olive,” he says. Then there are edible flowers and leaves like Hanaho, Shisho, Sansho, Mitsuba leaf, Fujiko and Benitade.

Vikramjit Roy, sous chef in-charge, Wasabi, adds: “There’s also frozen, dried, purple sweet potato, the Tatami Iwashi or dried baby sardine sheet and exotic Japanese vegetables like Kabocha, Kampyo and Mayoga.”

Meanwhile, chef Saito of MEGU says that one of his unusual ingredients is the very special Kanzuri chilli paste from Niigata, Japan. It’s a relish made by exposing hand-picked, red peppers to the snow, then adding salt and malted rice to it and leaving it to ferment for three years. His Crispy Kanzuri Shrimp is definitely worth trying.

Saito’s guests are also drawn by cooking methods like Sumibi Aburiyaki and Toban Yaki. Aburiyaki, says Saito, is a grilling technique using Bincho-Tan, a special charcoal found only near Kyoto. The coal is virtually smokeless, reaches up to 1000°C without producing flames and costs a tidy Rs 6,000 per kilo. And let’s not forget that each dish at MEGU is served in a specially-designed, handcrafted plate or bowl inspired by the dish itself.

Vikramjit Roy, sous chef in-charge at Wasabi by Morimoto at The Taj Mahal Hotel, New Delhi, has exotic Japanese vegetables like Kabocha, Kampyo and Mayoga on his menu

Rajat Kalia, restaurant manager MEGU says that they’ve also introduced the Toban Yaki technique of cooking which traditionally means to roast on a ceramic plate. The heat absorption and radiation properties of ceramic plates used in this technique make it an ideal choice for cooking meats and seafood that retain their juices and flavours.

At Edo in Bangalore, there’s even a Robata counter — an L-shaped open grill. And Konomi at Trident, Gurgaon, has its popular Yakitori grill. Chef Ramon Semira, Japanese chef, at Konomi, says that the Yakitori grill is for cooking meats in their own juices. His regulars love his donburis or rice bowl dishes.

The restaurants are flying in 80 per cent to 90 per cent of the meats, veggies and sauces every two to three days from Japan and Europe. The fish usually comes from Tsukiji Fish Market, Japan’s giant seafood market in Tokyo.

Of sushi, breakfasts and Bento lunches

Of course, sushi and sashimi continue to be hot-sellers. So, whenever actor Sushmita Sen lands in the capital, she often heads straight to The Oberoi Delhi to keep her date with the hotel’s live sushi station at threesixty°, the hotel’s all-day, speciality dining restaurant.

Sen’s a fan of the innovative sushi chef, Augusto . Cabrera, whose expertise lies in creating innovative concoctions of modern sushi which are a huge hit with his guests. His signature dishes — Itamae Maki and Shokunin Maki — are examples of the two very different sushi wraps that he creates with a combination of traditional Japanese and modern sushi recipes. “I change my signature rolls every four to five months,” says Augusto. He’s also created a special seven spice sauce, which as its name suggests, is a mix of seven spices including poppy and sesame seeds.

It’s flair cooking at its best at threesixtyone° at The Oberoi Gurgaon with Teppanyaki chef John Mark tossing and juggling his ingredients as he cooks at the grill

Cabrera gets his supplies from different countries — salmon from Scotland, tuna and salmon eggs from Holland.

Differently flavoured sushi comes your way from Japanese master chef, Hiroshi Isomura, at The Oberoi Gurgaon’s threesixtyone°. Isomura specialises in fusion Japanese cooking including fusion sushi and various types of ‘kaisaki’ or Japanese set menus — vegetarian, traditional and fusion — which are usually a minimum of seven courses.

Nakamura at Pan Asian says that his sushi and sashimi platters continue to be highly popular while Ramon Semira at Konomi spends long hours behind a Greek Thassos marble sushi counter where he carves his platters of sushi and sashimi.

The exhaustive menu at Sakura, The Metropolitan Hotel & Spa, has been designed by master chef Tetsu Akahira

Japanese breakfasts are also the way to go at threesixtyone° and Baywatch, the multi-cuisine restaurant at WelcomHotel Sheraton New Delhi. Here you can start your day with a traditional Japanese breakfast for around Rs 1,500. A Japanese breakfast, in case you are wondering, can include hearty servings of Miso soup, cold Japanese pickle, cold omelette, cold tofu, steamed Japanese rice and grilled red snapper in light soya sauce.

The Bento box lunch — which Semira says is the equivalent of a Japanese thali — is your best bet as a complete Japanese meal. The Bento is one of the offerings at ITC, not just at Pan Asian but also at Edo.

The chefs can grill

Chef Ramon Semira presides over the sushi bar and Yakitori grill at Trident, Gurgaon

When Japanese restaurants open shop, can Teppanyaki grills be far behind? Says Suttison of Zen: “With Teppanyaki, the soup is served first, followed by salad, the main course, vegetables, fruit and dessert. Side dishes of Miso soup, asparagus, tomato, cucumber, zucchini salads, sushi rice rolled nori appetisers and Ninniku fried rice usually accompany the main dishes.

Teppanyaki is favoured by many chefs including John Mark, Saito and Nakamura who bring huge excitement to the cooking as they expertly toss, twist and juggle ingredients theatrically to produce some fine Teppanyaki delights. Mark’s tiger prawns with boursin cheese and the flambéed prime meats with cognac is a winner. 

MIND YOUR JAPANESE Ps AND Qs

Bento

Bento is a single portion take-out, compartmentalised packed Japanese meal of rice, fish or meat portions and cooked vegetable portions.

Sushi

You already know this one. But what’s the best way to eat sushi? With just a touch of wasabi and soy.

Sashimi

A favourite Japanese delicacy of very fresh, raw seafood, sliced into thin slices, served with wasabi paste and dipped in soy sauce.

Wasabi

This indigenous Japanese horseradish is known for its property of losing flavour and pungency within 15 minutes of being cooked.

Teppanyaki

This is Japanese cuisine cooked on an iron griddle. In Japanese, ‘teppan’ means an iron plate or a steel sheet, and ‘yaki’ is stir-fried food or stir-frying.