Coolest restaurants for 2021
Covid-19 has not killed creativity. And while many of us have curtailed our travel lately, the world’s professional eaters are still out there exploring (with masks, tests, distance and regular quarantines, of course). In a year that surprises, simple pleasures and heartfelt hospitality mattered more than ever, they have been unfurling their napkins in dining rooms from Bangkok to New York to the Faroe Islands.
I asked a few of them which restaurants have impressed them the most—not necessarily Michelin star holders or World’s 50 Best entries, but just deeply satisfying meals that are worth a visit whenever you can get there. Kristian Brask Thomsen is a culinary ambassador, award-winning filmmaker (Michelin Stars), world tour manager and host of dinner parties extraordinaire. Gerhard Huber, one of a very small number of people who has dined at every three-star Michelin restaurant in the world, is a cofounder of foodle.pro, an international online community of food enthusiasts. And Marco Invernizzi is one of the best non-Japanese Bonsai masters in the world, a deep diver with orcas and a passionate seeker of the world’s most innovative restaurants.
Atomix, New York City
“Atomix uses the wide range of Korean techniques to bring ingredients foreign and familiar to new heights,” Invernizzi says. “Every dish is introduced by a card that describes the Korean origin of the ingredients and enlightens the guest about how well rooted Atomix’s new ideas are in a centuries-long culinary tradition. Wagyu, foie gras and mole sauce may not scream ‘Seoul’, but they are the new vehicles to deliver gentle flavours and surprisingly refreshing dishes. Chefs JP and Hasung’s masterful storytelling will take you on a very unique journey.”
Boragó, Santiago, Chile
“Rodolfo Guzmán is a unique chef, and had Boragó not been situated in Santiago — literally at the very end of the world — but instead in Europe or the United States, and he not been such a modest man, then Boragó would have been on everyone’s lips and at the very top of every ranking list around,” Brask Thomsen says. [Though it just jump up to number 6 on the new Latin America’s 50 Best last week.] for “Boragó can be considered the Noma of South America, though solely on its own terms and, up until recently, the undiscovered terroir of its ingredients. (Chile is the rough Nordics of Latin America.) Guzmán introduces Chilean ingredients, products and techniques to the world for the first time while literally rewriting his country’s culinary rulebook. Boragó’s menu is super-micro-seasonal, and you taste almost supernatural products you’ve never heard about before, executed with intelligence, boldness and beauty.”
Dani Maison, Ischia, Italy
“In one of the most ‘dolce vita’ islands of the Mediterranean, surrounded by a garden that could only be found in fairytale, chef Nino di Costanzo seduces his guests with his innovative vision about the very best ingredients and suggestions of the Campania region elevated to the finest culinary art,” Invernizzi says. “Art is everywhere at Dani Mason, from the one-off plates to the modern paintings on walls, from the circus dessert display to the object trove in the garden.”
Higashiyama Wakon, Kanazawa, Japan
“This is one of the most beautiful restaurants I have ever visited,” Huber says. “Once you find the entrance, tucked away in the quiet streets of Higashiyama Chaya (one of the geisha districts of Kanazawa) you enter a narrow pathway that opens onto a beautiful garden. Then you need to find the door, which is not full size, so even short people need to bow. When you make it inside, you find an awe-inspiring space with counter seats and two tables. The architecture is pure and refined, and the kitchen is so small that it would fit into a studio apartment. There are up to four chefs, led by Mr. Imai. Their cuisine is a modern take on the traditional kaiseki. The dishes are simple but daring; the combination of flavours is inspired; the execution, perfect.”
Koks, Faroe Islands
“The Faroe Islands are an ancient microcosmos of exciting products, Nordic history, Viking tales, 37 words for fog and even more for fermented produce, 70 000 sheep, a thriving fishing industry, ravishing waterfalls, eccentric personalities, a native tongue only spoken by some 50 000 — and then they have the culinary pearl, Koks,” Brask Thomsen says, who has made the restaurant the centerpiece of his second culinary film, Michelin Stars II, in production now.
“Koks is an almost mythological place in a hobbit setting; a two-star Michelin restaurant situated in a low-ceilinged farmhouse with grass on the roof, at the corner of luscious green fields surrounded by rolling hills and a lake filled with trout, isolated on an archipelago in the middle of the Nordic Seas. Koks is a restaurant not only trying to be or show sustainability but living it at its core. A vast majority of the produce is sourced within a few miles of the restaurant, in the surrounding hills and ocean. Working with small producers and personally acquainted scallop divers, seaweed experts, hunters and fishermen, Koks is a boundless depth of pristine culinary beauty.”
Noor, Córdoba, Spain
“What makes Noor (‘light’ in Arabic) hyper-interesting is the culinary history lesson that chef Paco Morales offers in Córdoba’s Moorish heritage from the 10th to the 15th century, when Andalusia was known as Al-Ándalus under Arabic rule,” Brask Thomsen says.
“Although Noor is located in the working-class suburb where Morales grew up, you practically feel like you’re sitting in a house in the middle of Sahara a thousand years ago. The cuisine has a similar inspiration, with modern culinary techniques combining with the flavours, aromas and subtleties of dishes from the past. Like a culinary Indiana Jones, Morales recovers, studies and shapes a new epicurean language from the ruins of a prosperous Spanish-Arabic past.”
Rote Wand Chef’s Table, Schualhus, Lech, Austria
“Brooklyn Fare meets the Austrian Alps!” enthuses Huber. “Max Natmessnig cooked for four and a half years for César Ramirez in one of the best restaurants in the Western Hemisphere, Chef’s Table at Brooklyn Fare. When he moved to the Alps, he intelligently translated his learnings into his new environment. The result is simply the best restaurant in Austria. It all starts with his ingredients, sourced mostly from the west of Austria, from selected suppliers. His creativity and fine calibrated palate enable him to create phenomenal dishes. All of this embedded in Austrian hospitality and casual easiness makes this meal an extraordinary experience.”
Sorn, Bangkok
“In a reconstructed old house in the center of Bangkok, the flavors of Khun Ice and Chef Yod bring us down to the southernmost regions of Thailand, where spicy dishes with an occasional Muslim influence create the base for a truly unique experience,” Invernizzi says. “The open-air kitchen, nestled in a tropical garden, uses only southern ingredients to elevate the traditions and introduce the guests to a new understanding of what contemporary Thai cuisine has the potential to offer.” — Forbes.com