Best dish you have had in the last 30 days?

[usleepicreep]

Connecticut style lobster roll


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[El Presidente]

Moda's steaks are second to none 👍

 

[El Presidente]

Love a lobster thermidor 

 

[shokao]

 

[westg]

Simple BBQ yum

[99call]

2 hours ago, westg said:

Simple BBQ yum

few things better in life than 'three roasties' with rice.  Always a difficult choice as what to go for.  My choice of late is Cold soy braised chicken, Peking duck, and crispy belly pork.  but as soon as it arrives on the table, I berate myself for not ordering a 'Four roasties' with rice.    Heavy hangs the crown of a committed glutton

[hrs1]

🤤 

[cnov]

Accompanied by a nice big dollop of Salsa Verde and a very enjoyable bottle of wine. Love this time of year.

[yadegari6]

Great food from a recent trip to Montréal 

[99call]

31 minutes ago, yadegari6 said:

Great food from a recent trip to Montréal 

Shiso + Uni + caviar is big thumbs up from me

[El Presidente]

Artie took Di and I here on Monday night. 

Beyond stunning 

 

This omakase restaurant in Fortitude Valley is so in-demand it's already booked out for 2023

Just six diners a sitting are invited through a secret door and into chef Katsu Huang's tiny home restaurant.

Despite the fact it doesn’t advertise and there’s absolutely no signage, Brisbane’s most secretive restaurant has just closed bookings for 2023.

Katsu Ya in Fortitude Valley hosts only six diners four nights a week, omakase-style and even if a space does open up, you’ll need a referral to score a seat.

“It is our home and the diners are our friends and family. Six is the maximum capacity to provide the best quality of service because there’s just me, no sous chef and no wait staff,” says owner and chef Katsu Huang.

“We don’t turn over tables, because if you invite your friends or family to your home, you can’t kick out your first group and say: ‘Oh, sorry guys, I have a second group of friends coming’.”

I’m perched at the six-seat counter overlooking the kitchen in a tiny space reached through an unmarked wooden door from a Valley side street.

There are no commercial appliances or tricked-up culinary toys and none of the usual workaday accoutrements of a restaurant kitchen; no squeezy bottles with sharpie-scrawled tape labels, no stacks of stainless-steel catering trays or opaque rectangular plastic boxes filled with micro herbs or mis en place – it is absolutely pristine and bare-bones minimal.

“I have just six of everything,” says Huang,  pictured above, with wife Denise Yang. He waves behind him at the shelf holding the tableware, which he says was chosen to match the wall murals painted by artist Jake Reston.

“I am a bit OCD,” he confesses.

“Oh yes, he is,” agrees Denise, nodding vigorously, “at home too.”

Originally from Taiwan, Huang and Yang came to Brisbane a decade ago. Huang’s love of cooking was sparked in his mother’s kitchen and stoked in Japanese restaurants in Taipei, where he worked after leaving school at 14.  He has only ever been drawn to Japanese cuisine, citing the aesthetics and clean flavours and pointing out the culinary influences left by the Japanese who annexed the country from 1895 to 1945 mean it’s not really a “foreign” cuisine per se.

“Japanese food is not like any other. You don’t just learn and then you become a chef. You continue to be a student,” Huang says.

Part of the discipline, he says is patience.

“For many years, I was only allowed to was to wash the rice and prepare the vegetables, but that was part of my development as a chef – it was important for my career.”

After 15 years rising through the ranks, Huang emigrated to Australia where he joined the kitchen brigade at Sono at Portside.

In 2021, the couple quietly opened Katsu Ya, a restaurant to cook for family originally, but now seating strangers, providing they are introduced via a previous customer.

It’s apparent, talking with Huang, that he doesn’t register a work/life divide. He really does see the restaurant as an extension of his home and his customers as friends for whom he enjoys preparing multi-course feasts.

“I just cook what I feel like eating,” Huang says.

Course after course is prepared on a four-burner induction stovetop with a miniature hibachi grill as back-up. There’s no set number –  it’s how many he thinks fit.

“No one ever, ever leaves hungry,” Huang laughs.

The transactional nature of the exchange seems almost distasteful to Huang.

“It’s not about the money.  It’s just sharing for love. Yes, we still earn a little bit, but it’s more than money.”

While the menu is free-flowing, inspired by the season, availability and chef’s whim, high-end seafood is a big focus.

Huang reaches under the counter and pulls up a box, “sea urchin,” he says reverently, peeling back the paper.

“They’re fresh, just arrived today from Japan today. They taste really different from what you get here. Creamy.”

In another box are rows of fat, glistening, scallops. “They are so sweet.”

Like the environs, Katsu Ya’s drinks menu is minimalist: just one beer, sake that Wang himself imports, and a whisky.

“Of course, if you want you can bring your own drinks, no problem,” he says.

It’s an extraordinary place with a chef who is both simultaneously humble and sure-footed.

“Sometimes when you go out, at the end they ask ‘how was everything?’ I find it confusing. What do you mean how was everything? It must be good. It must be the best. I don’t have to ask –  I prepared it to be good.”

[El Presidente]

Favourites?

3 week dry aged Japanese Bluefin

2  week aged  grilled kingfish

12+ score Kobe ....with certificate of authenticity 

 

[Chas.Alpha]

Rats! Now I'm hungry...😔

[Chibearsv]

Wow Rob!  I just drooled down my shirt. 🤤

[WarriorPrincess]

I was drooling all night each time he put the food in front of me 

When you thought the one you just ate was amazing the next one was even better.

What an experience, fantastic night and he is a really lovely person, he was so happy just to listen and watch us all loving each meal. 

[JohnS]

That restaurant...everything about it sounds incredible! I would imagine that 2024 bookings will start to fill up soon too!

[Fuzz]

On 7/9/2023 at 7:32 PM, 99call said:

few things better in life than 'three roasties' with rice.  Always a difficult choice as what to go for.  My choice of late is Cold soy braised chicken, Peking duck, and crispy belly pork.  but as soon as it arrives on the table, I berate myself for not ordering a 'Four roasties' with rice.    Heavy hangs the crown of a committed glutton

That is why you just order one of everything then dabao the rest.

[WarriorPrincess]

19 hours ago, JohnS said:

That restaurant...everything about it sounds incredible! I would imagine that 2024 bookings will start to fill up soon too!

John we were told on Monday night that he is already booked up to November 2024 

[JohnS]

5 hours ago, WarriorPrincess said:

John we were told on Monday night that he is already booked up to November 2024 

Wow, that's both amazing and fantastic!

[BoliDan]

Ceviche served on fresh oysters and a michealada. Yum

[LLC]

11am flight from Newark to Toronto was canceled and I was rebooked on a flight at 3pm. Killed some time by walking to a restaurant and had an awesome Lobster Roll. 
Didn’t know at the time that was going to be the best part of my day. 3pm flight also cancelled and in order to not have to stay another night, I booked a flight for 7:30pm from LaGuardia. That flight finally left just after 11pm so after a 12 hour delay got home around 1:30am. Travel lately had been brutal but this was about as bad as I’ve seen. I could have driven home and made it in time for an early dinner 😂. I’ll will remember that lobster roll though. 

[SigmundChurchill]

21 hours ago, LLC said:

11am flight from Newark to Toronto was canceled and I was rebooked on a flight at 3pm. Killed some time by walking to a restaurant and had an awesome Lobster Roll. 
Didn’t know at the time that was going to be the best part of my day. 3pm flight also cancelled and in order to not have to stay another night, I booked a flight for 7:30pm from LaGuardia. That flight finally left just after 11pm so after a 12 hour delay got home around 1:30am. Travel lately had been brutal but this was about as bad as I’ve seen. I could have driven home and made it in time for an early dinner 😂. I’ll will remember that lobster roll though. 

Where is the restaurant?

[SigmundChurchill]

We went to the Polo Bar tonight, which is Ralph Lauren’s restaurant in NYC.  Food was amazing.  I wish I took pictures of it.  Absolutely amazing burger.  The rib-eye steak was out of this world.  And the fish was really good too.

I got a few pictures, just not of the main courses.

 

 

[LLC]

44 minutes ago, SigmundChurchill said:

Where is the restaurant?

Tommy’s Tavern + Tap in Morris Plains, NJ. Lots of good options on the menu. 

[SigmundChurchill]

15 minutes ago, LLC said:

Tommy’s Tavern + Tap in Morris Plains, NJ. Lots of good options on the menu. 

Thats 10 minutes from my house.  They have really good food.  The cigar lounge where I smoke all the time is just up the street from there.