There is a restaurant in Iidabashi, Tokyo that opens the door to unknown cuisine through extremely innovative experiments. INUA opened in the summer of 2018. When you eat this dish, you will feel as if you are taking a walk through a deep forest and eventually becoming a part of the scenery. Japan's seas, mountains, forests, and villages. The food is like a lyrical poem, carried by the wind that blows there, transcends time and space, and resonates with people and the earth. We visited the space where the food is created.

Inheriting noma's DNA,
A German chef fascinated by Japan

INUA opened in June 2018. In February of the following year, it won the world's number one award in the ``Arrival of the Year'' category at the newly established French gastronomy award ``World Restaurant Awards 2019''. This award is for restaurants opened between October 2017, 10 and September 1, 2018 that have a fresh concept and are leading the evolution of the restaurant industry. It was awarded two stars in the Michelin Guide 9, which was announced on November 30, 2019.

INUA's head chef is Thomas Froebel, originally from Noma in Copenhagen, which has been hailed as one of the best restaurants in the world. He was the chef who was in charge of menu development when Noma was selected as the best in the world at a food award, and he came to Japan because he ``fell in love with Japan and wanted to learn more about Japanese ingredients.'' In 2015, he encountered Japanese food culture for the first time at Noma's pop-up restaurant at Mandarin Oriental Tokyo, and was captivated by it.

A place where Japanese ingredients and Scandinavian atmosphere resonate

INUA's dining space is spacious and exudes the comfort of an unpretentious Nordic style. In the lounge area where you can relax on the sofa, you can enjoy an aperitif during a meeting, dessert or tea after a meal. Plans are also underway for customers to be able to enjoy a la carte dishes at the counters in this area. The dining space overlooks the open kitchen where the chef works, and this space is also enveloped in a friendly atmosphere with the warmth of the wood. The chefs and staff come from all over the world, including Europe and South America, and many guests come from overseas. It's a food space where being global is completely normal.

Traveling around Japan, visiting production areas and discovering ingredients

Before opening the restaurant, INUA traveled extensively throughout Japan to research food, visit production areas, meet producers, and experience the climate in which the crops are produced. During that trip, he also visited an Ainu village in Hokkaido, where he learned about the method of smoking salmon and the culture of making clothing from beech wood, and felt there were many similarities between the Ainu and Inuit. The store's name, INUA, means ``the soul that dwells in all things,'' and is a word that has its origins in Inuit mythology, meaning the life force and spirit that resides in nature.

While traveling around Japan, he learned about ancient Japanese cooking methods such as smoking, fermentation, and aging, and he values ​​going back to the past and applying it to the present. They learned how to eat wakame shabu-shabu and the food culture of eating insects, and at a forestry site in Nagano, they tried a Uwamizu cherry tree in their mouths, and in Wakayama they came across a mountain loquat that smells like a flower. INUA has staff who specialize in research and purchasing, and they are still traveling around Japan rediscovering various ingredients.

Simple cuisine through complexity

If I were to describe INUA's cuisine in one word, it would be COMPLEX SIMPLICITY, a concise cuisine created through complexity. Its complexity requires a daunting amount of time and effort. A variety of ingredients are collected from all over Japan, and the process begins with exploring the possibilities of each ingredient and creating unique seasonings. Examples of seasonings include rice malt oil, cherry tree oil, miso water, pine stock, roasted kelp salt, and shochu malt. Some take several months to prepare, using methods such as aging, smoking, and drying.

There is a test kitchen downstairs in the restaurant, where the foods and seasonings that have been tested and created are lined up. Tofu is coated with cheese bacteria and aged for two weeks, making it similar to Camembert. Just like making black garlic, whole pineapple leaves and skin are caramelized over a period of 14 weeks, turning them black. But I don't know if it will taste good or be flavorful. So I'm trying everything.

Countless pieces come together to create a restaurant.

It is said that the countless seasonings created through these endless experiments are as colorful as possible. Froebel often compares things to Legos. When Lego is assembled, it becomes a house, and several houses are built to form a road, which eventually becomes a town. Similarly, each seasoning is a Lego piece that comes together to form a dish, and many dishes come together to form a course. Seasonings are made to increase the number of Lego pieces. The test kitchen for experimenting, recording, and analyzing is like a Wunderkammer (chamber of wonders) from the Renaissance or Baroque era. This natural history space is lined with items such as dried octopus, wild duck bones, and seaweed specimens. Instead of being chilly, you will be surrounded by an exciting and warm atmosphere.

After experiencing the climate in which the crops were grown, the cooking begins.

Despite all this, Froebel says INUA's culinary creativity is "99% built on failure." “The starting point in cooking is to make something that you want to eat and something that excites you.” Therefore, the adventure of ingredients begins. He thinks about the best way to eat a particular ingredient, and first places himself in the mountains, oceans, fields, and the land and climate where the ingredient was grown, and then uses that experience to develop his ideas and develop them.

INUA mainly serves dinner, with a course menu consisting of more than a dozen dishes. The way the food is served on the table is also ingenious. Each dish is different, and we have dishes that you mix yourself with a knife and fork, chopsticks, or your hands, and dishes that you can eat by breaking them over ice...we have a thorough desire for the people who eat them to enjoy them. ing. Have fun and be happy with cooking. At INUA, this feeling underlies everything we do. In the second part, we hear about Froebel's current thoughts, the background of his upbringing, and his future plans.

(Titles omitted)

Continued from Thomas Froebel's rediscovery of food (Part 2)

Thomas Frebel Thomas Frebel
Born in 1983 in Magdeburg, Germany. Since joining Noma in 2009, he has built the trust of Rene Redzepi as the head of research and development, and has also worked at pop-up stores in Tokyo, Sydney, and Mexico, leading Noma as Redzepi's right-hand man. He became INUA's head chef in June 2018. In February 6, INUA won first place in the world at the "World Restaurant Awards 2019" (new restaurant category of the year). TBS Sunday Theater broadcast from October 2, 2019"Grand Maison Tokyo"(TBS 28 stations nationwide every Sunday from 21:00pm).
https://inua.jp/

INUA
KADOKAWA Fujimi Building 2F, 13-12-9 Fujimi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo
Every Tuesday to Saturday from 18:XNUMX (dinner only)
Sunday lunch held several times a month, irregularly
There is also a private dining room that seats up to 12 people. We can also discuss private parties and events.
Closed every Sunday and Monday
booking@inua.jp
Inquiries regarding reservations: TEL 03-6683-7570 (Reception hours: Tuesday to Saturday 11:00 – 16:00)

INUA official account
Instagram　inuajp
Twitter　@INUA_JP
Facebook　https://www.facebook.com/INUAjp/