Pop up goes The Experience

Don’t write off The Experience just yet. Reif Othman, the award-winning chef who ran the successful but short-lived Dubai hotspot, says the concept will return in pop-up format over the next couple of years, even as he juggles duties overseeing Sumosan Twiga for former F1 team owner Flavio Briatore.

Having got a taste for pop-ups in Cannes last year, where he took Play for the summer, Othman will be bringing his food to unusual venues around the nation over the next few years before he makes a decision on whether to re-open the restaurant.

“The closure is temporary, and I’m looking forward to do pop-ups,” he says, adding that these could be in Dubai or elsewhere. He recently collaborated with fellow chefs John Buenaventura and Luis Ezqueta Figueroa on a global tapas menu at Cuisinero Uno restaurant.

He says he wants to see the brand revamp through at Sumosan before he decides on his next step. “I could decide to reopen The Experience in a couple of years’ time,” he says. “But maybe not in Dubai.”

Where then, I ask? The backstreets of Tokyo, he smiles — or Galway, in Ireland.