Morimoto Masaharu is stressed. The famously unflappable Iron Chef, familiar to Food Network addicts around the planet, clearly doesn’t like to be kept waiting — and it shows. There’s no steam behind a sushi bar, but his expression says it all, although the old pro is too polite to verbalise it.
We’ve been so engrossed around taking photographs of his new restaurant, of the glass-boxed tree in its centre, of the trippy infinity room, of its endless sushi bar and cosy private areas; we’re so engrossed getting around this ginormous two-level venue that we’re late to our interview.
Or maybe it’s the weight of his 450-seat restaurant in Dubai’s Business Bay district, I hazard as we finally sit down for a chat at the outdoor bar after another round of photos.
“Pressure? Of course, I’ve got blood pressure. I take medicines every day,” he laughs as the colour returns to his face. So he’s got no problem filling what must be one of the city’s largest restaurants, I ask? Dressed in the sharpest shorts-and-blazer combination I’ve seen, he casually shrugs off the question. “Nothing is no problem in my life. But this is not the biggest restaurant, I have one in Orlando that’s 570 seats, bigger than this.”
But they’re all coming for your name, I say. “Of course I have a lot of pressure,” he admits finally. “I have no kids, but here I have 200 kids,” he smiles.
His route to success, he says in true Asian spirit, is to make his customer happy. “And to do that, I have to make my employees happy. So we can welcome the customer with our hospitality, with our smiles, with our hearts.”
He obviously can’t forge a personal relationship with all 200 people on his team, yet, of the slew of new restaurants to open this year, Morimoto Dubai at the Renaissance Dubai Downtown Hotel is a game changer on many levels, as I discover on a little VIP terrace afterwards. From the food to the service, the attention to detail is palpable and there are only very few — and very minor — slips.
The hostess who greets you at the door and offers to show you around — in our case, the elegant and friendly Jelissa — walked us to the elevator on the way out. When I took my jacket off as the room warmed up in the main dining area, someone else immediately offered to hang it up. The various different staff at our table knew the menu inside out and were able to answer all our questions just days after the March 29 opening, with none of that “let-me-check” drivel. Upstairs, the keypad-only private deck area ups the ante on privacy, offering Instagrammable views of the Burj Khalifa and Dubai Water Canal.
In terms of food, the menus — the easiest part, you might say, with many Stateside signatures on display — spark a sense of curiosity, while remaining accessible in terms of choice, if not quite in terms of price. The sashimi selection, for example, extends beyond the usual salmon, tuna and hamachi to anago, Japanese salt-water eel that’s distinct from its popular but less muscly cousin, unagi (also available).
Some of this is achieved, Morimoto says, by teaming up with one of the world’s biggest hotel operators — in this case Marriott. Part of it comes down to training — key staff from Morimoto Dubai spent three immersive weeks at his Napa restaurant, while lieutenants from other outlets came in for extensive drills, and four Japanese chefs from the Tokyo operation have shifted to the UAE.
But much of it is Morimoto himself, whether it’s the approachable food or the service operation, refined over decades of new openings and gargantuan operations, first in Japan, then Philadelphia, and slowly the wider US and the rest of the world.
“I want to make the entrance wider for people who don’t know our food,” the Nobu alumnus says, expounding on his bridge-building fusion of contemporary Japanese recipes with Western techniques and ingredients (although he rejects the term, labelling it confusion).
“People who don’t know raw fish, they know pizza, they know tortilla dough, they know black olives, anchovy aioli, so I take a crispy tortilla and add raw tuna, red onions, jalapeno, olives. The sauce is anchovy aioli. If it looks pretty, you want to try it. Trying is important to me — if I can make the entrance wider, I can welcome you to my world. Next time, you’ll order tuna sashimi.”
He approaches his team with respect, explaining how the menu came about after discussions with Spanish Executive Chef Miguel Huelamo. “He’ll tell me what he wants to do and we’ll have a discussion about technique and ideas. And then we cook it and try the dish and discuss more,” Morimoto explains. “I want to be a conductor, so I let him do his job, and I’ll conduct the show so the right person is in the right position.”
But with 15 restaurants from Tokyo to Mumbai to Mexico City to Hawaii (he heads back to Waikiki Beach to open a Momosan ramen joint next week), how does he find the time to sleep? After all, his name’s above the door, and each venue must match up to that obsessive Japanese attention to detail.
Like few other celebrity chefs associated with Dubai ventures — one top-draw virtuoso only visited his restaurant once during a three-year contract — Morimoto says he insists that each restaurant send the Manhattan head office a daily report from both front and back of house.
“We might get on a conference call, check what the manager did. Sometimes I have to send somebody here, sometimes I come myself.” The travelling and the business mean he’s had to turn down Iron Chef America a couple of times, and that he’s only slept on his own pillow in New York City for two nights this year. For now, he says he’ll be in Dubai once each season.
Is that enough for such a massive undertaking, even if it’s not all his own money? For sure there are issues to be overcome. After extremely attentive service all evening, things begin to slacken once the mains are cleared away — oddly enough, as the restaurant quietens down.
The music is too loud too early on. Gluten-free soya sauce would be awesome. For a restaurant with this level of attention to detail, it’s the little things that will make a difference. Despite all that, though, Morimoto Dubai stands head and shoulders above the pack. Although we were there on an invite, it’s been a long time since I haven’t felt there were rough edges to be pared away, nor that I might feel shortchanged if I had to pay for my meal. Go now, while everything’s on top form.
First taste of Morimoto Dubai
The food, dear reader, sings. That’s entirely appropriate at a restaurant where the chef sees himself as a conductor. And the dishes that resonate loudest are those that straddle different cultures on a menu wide enough to embrace all the different audiences in this salad bowl of a city.
We start our evening outdoors with a pair of romantic drinks called U and Mi, while grabbing a selfie against the Burj Khalifa. But I’m after the full-on dining room experience, so we move to a window table on the inside, as the restaurant quickly fills up. Andreas, the server at our table, is able to advise on the gluten content in every dish, but thankfully stops short of recommendations.
My first bite is of Hokkaido oysters topped with foie gras, lashings of teriyaki sauce and chopped chives. Its sweet, velvet embrace warms me up straight away, but it’s so rich, so refined, I wonder if anything else can match up.
The toro tartare, which arrives next, steals the show. Fatty tuna belly worked to the consistency of pate and accompanied with six condiments from wasabi to sweet nori paste to sour cream to rice crackers to caviar (sturgeon, of course) that you can scrape onto the fish, each morsel hits a different part of the palate.
After that, my first taste of anago eel is a bristly contrast, and I seek refuge in a silky gold sea urchin whose oiliness is offset by a sharp tartness that glides to a glorious mouth finish.
My friend, who says the Wagyu-only selection of steaks demonstrates Morimoto’s commitment to quality, is disappointed by his tenderloin. He wanted it medium rare, but it’s warm all through and more brown than pink. No doubt it’s been helped along its journey by the hotplate it sits on. A sizzling, umami-heavy sauce adds to the drama but fillets away its essence. It’s the one discordant note in this harmony, although sides of sweet, skin-on baby potatoes and spicy, lemony broccolini play a redeeming part.
Luckily, I went with Andreas’ suggestion of the lobster with garam masala, which sits on a Mediterranean-style caponata. The Indian spice mix is incredibly gentle and there’s just a hint of chilli that could be togarashi. While not quite buttery, the meat is soft and soothing, and I find much joy in mining each part of the shell.
After that, a gentle cup of sensha tea calms, cheers and comforts in equal measure.
Check it out!
Morimoto Dubai sits on the 23rd and 24th floors of the Renaissance Dubai Downtown is open for dinner from 6pm to midnight, and features indoor and outdoor dining areas with a choice of private spaces. Expect to pay Dh500 for two without drinks.
