New, exciting fine dining tapas restaurant that everyone is talking about!
PUBLISHED September 11th, 2014 04:00 pm | UPDATED January 20th, 2016 04:02 am
OMG! We’ve just heard news that Celebrity Chef John Doe Dory from the uber famous ‘Restaurant Unknown I’ has just opened up his own fine dining restaurant on the shores of Singapore, the cleverly named ‘Restaurant Unknown II’. He apparently has a shiny star given to him by a company that specialised in automobile tires so you know he must be good. Oh, and he’s really famous. Like totes famous. Apparently. Well that’s what the press release said anyway.
Anyway, Restaurant Unknown II is set to blow Singapore away with it’s totally unique concept of molecular gastronomy fusion tapas cuisine served Kaiseki style. Omakase at its best.
It’s really exclusive too. From what I’ve heard, the waiting list is 1 year already, and with an overpriced menu by celebrity Chef John that is apparently serving up food that is slightly better than average, we just couldn’t wait to go!
Luckily the City Nomads team managed to bribe a few people and did some favours we’re not too proud of and scored a sneak preview at Restaurant Unknown II’s opening set lunch menu.
Arriving at the entrance, we were surprised to learn that Chef Doe Dory would not actually be cooking the meal, but was in fact only consulting Chef for the first 2 months and had since buggered off back to Paris, London, Melbourne… or somewhere else that was not Singapore. Oh well. I’m sure his stand-in Chef Someguy would do justice to the meal.
This aside, we sat down in great anticipation waiting for the tantric tapas foodgasm to start… Oh baby….
The first course arrived in the form of foraged mushrooms on a cloudy bed of asparagus foam with a herb-smoked bone marrow reduction.
I don’t know about you, but I love foam in my food. It just makes me want to have a bath. And these mushrooms. Just wow, 2 shrivelled, earthy morsels that looks like the Chef has literally plucked them right out the ground before dinner service.
It was a party in my mouth and nobody was invited! I’m serious, this course was tiny. If you try to steal some off my plate I will stab you with a fork.
No matter, next up was the main course, the Supreme Wagyu steak – the main event.
Beef from the Komotogikikatsumatsu region of Japan (apparently these cows are not only massaged everyday but are also played Beethoven by the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra to keep them really chilled out). Topping this Marble grade 900 beef was a slab of pan seared foie gras (air-flown of course!), which was in turn topped with an orange burst of fresh Japanese Uni…. The final garnish was an elegant slither of white truffles (also air-flown) shaved directly onto our plate by a Chef wearing a Michael Jackson style white glove… Wow.
On the side was the obligatory vegetable, caramelised carrots. Placed there clearly as a token gesture to mock the mighty stack of indulgence. It sat there like an Oompa Lumpa, totally dwarfed by the Willy Wonka mountain next to it.
As the waiter moonwalked away to another table, I couldn’t help but feel that I may have had a minor heart attack by the third bite. Totally worth it.
Finally the dessert of deconstructed molten lava cake arrived. I can only imagine that the Chef put a perfectly good molten lava cake in the blender and then Chef said something ‘Bam! Deconstructed! Serve this up and put a cut strawberry on top’. It was made with real chocolate though so bonus points for not veering too far from the original recipe.
After paying the bill which was a very fair $500 per person I felt something deep rumble from the depths of my stomach. At first I thought it was bliss….then I thought the main course had come back to finish me off my already clogged arteries. I finally realised that whilst the meal had been beautifully crafted, it was nonetheless ‘tapas’. Which apparently is Spanish for ‘dishes designed to feed small children’.
With a final wave at the oh-so serious staff, we promptly headed over to Lavender Food centre and chowed down on some Sambal stingray, carrot cake and hor fun. Real bliss.
Regrets? None. This is fine dining at its best!
FYI, if you’ve made it this far and haven’t realised yet, this is a spoof article. Grow a sense of humour lah. TGIF!
