Nobu Tribeca

As I am still new in town my culinary tours limit to the familiar spots that locals would yawn at when reading about it. Too much has been written and told about all of them before.

I hope you still don't mind if I tell you about the best food I had here so far and at the same time one of the best in my life ;)

Earlier this month I went to Nobu in Tribeca which is the original restaurant of what is now a chain empire spread out over 13 countries. On their website they claim to be "the world's most recognized Japanese restaurant" which cannot be true, i) when they mean all the 30 chain restaurants on different continents and ii) when they serve fusion food.

However, if you want to see a spot that is exactly as you expect a fancy New York restaurant should be - this is the place to go. It was crowded and loud like hell, rich and beautiful folks. And with the underlying excitement that you feel when there could be celebrities around - what you only feel when you are not from Manhattan.

As to the food - I didn't take pictures for the lighting was too scanty but I filmed a little so that you can get an idea of the atmosphere. There are tons of pictures of each dish on the www anyway. It wasn't intended but in the end I opted for the signature dishes.


i)"Tiradito Nobu Style": scallops slices marinated with lemon juice and with a hint of coriander and chili.

--> Simple and pure.


ii) "Sashimi Salad with Matsuhisa Dressing": bluefin tuna sashimi with a pepper crust and a salad of wild lettuce, daikon hair, endives, radish, cucumber juliennes and a soy-sauce-rice-vinegar-dressing.

--> From an ecologically sound point of view I wouldn't encourage anybody to eat tuna in the 21th century. But this dish was ingenious, so abundant of different subtle flavors, I guess it would allow to make an exception here and never eat tuna again? ;). It was mind-boggling.

iii) "Zen": green tea mousse, almond sponge, chocolate praline crunch, grean tea cremoso and adzuki bean.

--> One of the best desserts I have ever had and I am grateful for the inspiration. I love mascarpone (or similar substitutes) and adzuki beans (I love every sweetness that Koreans make out of them, especially Patbingsu) and by chance, a sister's friend in Japan procured my first matcha tea recently (isn't that great when siblings have nice friends btw?) but I would have never thought about combining these favorite ingredients.

This is fusion food at its best - leaving the taste of traditional ingredients unadulterated but lifting them to another level through intersection.