Ars
⭐⭐⭐⭐
๐ซ๐ท French / ๐ Ningyocho
๐ Visits: 4
At lunch there are 3 choices. All choices come with salad, a plate of three appetizers and after-meal drink. Bouillabaisse curry is priced at JPY 1,280. Roast beef bowl is JPY 1,680. 'Bistro lunch' is JPY 2,800 and is one of the main dishes from the dinner bistro menu, changing from time to time. Prices include tax and no service charge is taken at lunch. But the place really comes alive at dinner. Here you have a choice between an a-la-carte bistro menu, a restaurant menu of about 9 courses for just JPY 11,000 + 5% service or about 6 courses for just JPY 5,500 + 5% service. The style of the restaurant menu at dinner is creative/modern presentation but using classical French cooking techniques and flavours. Food is quite heavily seasoned, which might not be for everyone but is right up my street. No English is spoken and there's no English menu.
Owner and head chef Kazuya Takagi previously worked as head chef at Calie and L'Evol, which have both now closed. Prior to that he worked at La Fins and L'Effervescence. Second chef and front-of-house Junichi Imai worked at La Bonne Table (which used to be outstanding but is, unfortunately, no longer in recent years). The most recent venture for both chefs was Sanmi which has relocated.
๐ Visit April 2021
Menu 'Souvenir', dinner
The first dish of a hot snack of pork pate served in a mini cheese bagel came out within a couple of minutes. My heart sank when I tasted this and I feared I was in for a night of bad food. I'm sure it really wasn't but I can only describe the taste as stale. I'm not sure pate is improved by putting it in the oven. 2/10.
Things improved slightly with a trio of amuse of crab cream croquette topped with caviar, bamboo charcoal tuile filled with onion cream and a horse meat tartar. Clearly a huge amount of work that had gone into this. The tuile was the best piece for me - a great combination of textures and contrast in sweetness from the onion and bamboo charcoal. 6/10.
Next was white asparagus from Loire 3 ways: shaved tips, boiled, made into a mousse and served with crispy bacon, sea urchin, lobster gelee and pea shoots. This dish had everything and was almost perfect. All the ingredients were very fresh, there was layer upon layer of flavour and texture from the surprise crispy bacon in the mousse. A bit more flavour from the gelee and you would have been happy eating this in a 3-Michelin star restaurant - it really was that spectacular. 9.5/10.
Next was foie gras terrine. Served with spiced meringue, Dekopon, chervil and Jerusalem artichoke puree. The meringue was rather astringent when eaten on its own but when you ate everything together all the flavours came together and you could still taste every individual element. 8.5/10.
The next dish was lobster and scallop mousse pithivier, bisque sauce and saltwort. This was a very rich and highly-seasoned dish. The pastry was butter-rich and looked like a piece of lacquered wood. There was more scallop mousse than lobster, though that's not a complaint. 8.5/10.
A surprise dish of consomme came. This was made from pigeon which was to follow. The pigeon was served with sauce salmis, rape blossoms puree and burdock chips. This was a large portion with the both the breast and leg served and the pigeon's head. The pigeon was perfectly cooked and delicious and served on a hot plate so retained its heat. Part way into the eating, chef brought out an extra element of a porcini cream sauce served in a mini copper pan. The burdock chips made the dish difficult to eat (easier to use your hands for those). 8.75/10 for the pigeon, 7/10 for the consomme.
Two kinds of bread, supplied by Style Bread, were served with good French butter and were a bit stodgy but had good flavour.
Pre-dessert was "Botanical Yoghurt" featuring a yoghurt sorbet, gin jelly, grapefruit and fresh tarragon. This was quite large for a pre-dessert and indeed the spoon was too small to easily reach the bottom of the glass. Nonetheless, this too was unusual and delicious. 8.5/10.
The main dessert was "daifuku" with strawberries, cocoa and truffle ice cream. I feel like this is a dessert that will divide people. For me (apart from the opening snack) this was the least successful dish. I don't really like daifuku and, while very smooth, the truffle ice cream was quite jarring. That said, I appreciated the creativity that went into it. 7/10.
A choice of after-dinner drink was served with four kinds of excellent petit fours including a freshly baked financier. 9/10.
Tonight there was one other table of two in the bistro and one other lone diner at the counter having the same course menu as me. Though not late, I arrived after him and service was was sped up for me so the main dish could be divided between us. No sooner had I finished one dish and the next dish was put down. 40 minutes in and I was already done with the 5th course, which is a little too quick for a ten course menu, especially when the food is as rich as this. I slowed things down when I got to the main course.
Pictures from an identical meal here.
Pate bagel
Kani croquette; Onion mousse; Horse meat tartar
White asparagus 3 ways, bacon, uni, lobster gelee
Foie gras terrine, spiced meringue, Jerusalem artichoke puree
Lobster and scallop mousse pithivier, bisque sauce and saltwort
Pigeon consomme
Pigeon, burdock chips, sauce salmis, rape blossoms puree, porcini cream
Botanical yoghurt
Strawberry daifuku truffle ice cream
Petit fours
Black tea
๐ด Damage: 13,190 (11k + 2 drinks @781 ea + 5%)
⏱️ Time taken: 1h40m
๐ Visit May 2021
Bistro lunch
1. Salad. Large portion of fresh salad leaves, dressing highly seasoned.
2. Cod beignet; potato salad; poached chicken, sauce gribiche. All pretty highly-seasoned. Beignet batter very thick but not oily in the slightest and good flavour.
3. Beef bourguignon. Textbook example of a very generous portion of beef cheek braised in red wine with mashed potato. I would have preferred it if there had been butter in the mash and would have liked more of it but the beef element was better than the version at Maison Marunouchi (review here). Served with warm baguette.
4. Nougat glace (+330). Packed with nuts and tasted very natural. Seemed to be missing honey. Wasn't to my taste but it's a matter of preference.
5. Coffee.
Not a particularly large lunch for JPY 2,800.
Pictures from an identical meal (minus the dessert) here.
๐ด Damage: 3,130
⏱️ Time taken: 45m
๐ Visit May 2021
Bouillabaisse curry lunch
1, 2. Salad and appetizers as previous lunch.
3. Curry. Again highly-seasoned. Packed with seafood. Flavour a bit one-note. Was it slightly caught?
4. Cheesecake (+330). Not special.
5. Coffee.
Pictures from a similar meal (starters different) here.
๐ด Damage: 1,610
⏱️ Time taken: 40m
๐ Visit July 2021
Menu 'Souvenir', dinner, 11,000
The course always starts with the bagel. It was better than I remembered it but it's really a pub snack - 3.5/10. Amuse was gyutan croquette with uni, sweetcorn puree tuile and shiro ika tartar with lime and karasumi. The croquette had no taste of gyutan and the uni was (I suppose to be expected) farmed. The rest was delicious. 7.5 - marked down for the croquette. Next was ayu bavarois, grilled ayu, cucumber gel, sour cream, caviar and cucumber. This was quite salty but the cucumber cooled it. 9/10. After the ayu was the foie gras dish. This was very similar to before but served with cherries rather than Dekopon. 8.5/10. The pithivier followed. This time the seafood was awabi. Ideally there would be more awabi and indulgence but in a multi-course menu and at this price that would be asking too much. One of the advantages of lone dining and as a returning customer was that I got a whole pithivier rather than having to share with a companion. The pithivier called for a glass of excellent and properly cold homemade ginger ale. 9/10 for the pithivier. The main course was rump of beef from Kumamoto. This was quite fatty and ate more like ichibo but chef insisted it was rump. The sauce was over-reduced like Marmite and overall the dish was too intense. I left most of the meat sauce and yearned for more of the kolrabi puree. A disappointing 6/10. Pre-dessert was like on my first visit but this time the main flavour was ume and it was even better. 9.5/10 (10 if they'd changed the spoon). Dessert proper was alcohol-free 'pina colada': pineapple, coconut cream, rum raisin ice cream, mint, coconut biscuits. All flavours I've had before but I still wanted to lick the plate. Finally a dessert here I thoroughly enjoyed - 8.5/10. Petits fours consisted of macaron, matcha financier, fruit jelly and chocolate ganache. All excellent - 9/10.
There were no problems with timing like last time and with the rich beef and whole pithivier I was stuffed.
Pictures from an identical meal here.
Pate bagel
Gyutan croquette, uni; sweetcorn puree tuile; shiro ika, lime tartar
Ayu bavarois, grilled ayu, cucumber gel, sour cream, caviar and cucumber
Foie gras, spiced meringue, sour cream, cherry
Awabi pithivier
Rump of Kumamoto beef
Botanical yoghurt: ume jelly, frozen yoghurt, tarragon, shiso.
Pina colada: pineapple, coconut cream, rum raisin ice cream, mint, coconut biscuits
Macaron, matcha financier, fruit jelly and chocolate ganache
Herb tea
๐ด Damage: 14,150 (11000 + 2 drinks at 2480 + 5%)
⏱️ Time taken: 1h45m
Four meals, four quite different experiences.
I said Ars was a small restaurant. That would do the restaurant a disservice: boutique is a better word. The 4-seat counter is made from a single piece of natural wood. Leather seats are expensive and comfortable. Wallpaper is bold - there's no beige or gray in this restaurant. Cutlery is Cutipol, Laguiloe and Takamura Hamono. Wine glasses are Zalto. Pottery is Tanshin. There is a large choice of quality wines. I don't know how this restaurant got funded but however it did, for a two-man shop it doesn't feel like anyone's holding back. Service was friendly, but still very professional, though cutlery is not replaced until you get to the main course. That might be acceptable with the bistro menu but I think they should reconsider that with the restaurant menu. I hesitate to say anything was original, particularly as I'd never eaten in Takagi-san's previous restaurants, and the set-up seems to be quite similar to Caile, but there were certainly dishes and elements that I'd never eaten before. I spent quite a while chatting with the chefs after my first dinner. When Takagi-san told me his favourite restaurant is Hommage my respect for him went up another notch.
My expectations for my second dinner were sky high and, while most of the food was very good, unfortunately the meal didn't fully live up to them. Chef said the menu would change with each season so I waited until summer for my return visit for dinner and was expecting a substantially different menu but only the ayu, main and dessert were really different. A couple dining next to me had the pigeon dish I had in April so their menu was even similar. There were no surprise elements this time and, indeed, the couple eating the pigeon dish didn't get the porcini cream.
There was a tense atmosphere on my second visit. The two chefs were not talking and at one point Takagi-san moved Imai-san's preparation from one point of the kitchen to another in a forceful manner and without saying a word. That's when I noticed there wasn't any background music like last time and sure enough, they then put some on. The tension was palpable. I was wondering if their relationship had broken down. Perhaps Takagi-san is difficult to work for, which might explain why his previous ventures haven't lasted that long? The restaurant was featured in Tokyo Calendar magazine earlier in the year but Imai-san was not mentioned. As of 16th August 2021 a vacancy for a chef is being advertised. Has Imai-san quit?
It's difficult to know what the future holds for Ars and difficult to score. Lunch and dinner are completely different. I plan on going back for the dinner bistro menu but I don't plan on going back for lunch and I'm not sure when I'll be going back for the full dinner course. My dinner in April was outstanding. I was hoping to go once a season for the dinner course but the menu was so similar second time there's no need in that sense. If everything had been excellent second time I might not mind eating the same dishes again but the main was particularly disappointing.
Right now the restaurant is trying to catch every possible customer with fine dining, casual dinner and cheap lunch options. If the restaurant becomes a real success I expect the dining options to evolve with the bistro part of the restaurant disappearing and a concentration on fine dining, a rise in prices and more liberal use of more expensive ingredients. When I drafted this review after my first visit I wrote "Ars is best opening of 2021 so far and the most exciting French restaurant to have opened in a long time.". I'm not so sure about that now but would strongly recommend anyone who loves French food visiting for dinner at least once. Everything about this restaurant says something you rarely get to say about dining out in Japan: flair. From the surprises and excellence in cooking, to the decoration of the restaurant, right down to the chef's choice of trousers. Each time on my way out, chef saw me to the door and motioned to touch elbows. How different from the usual bow.
๐ https://tabelog.com/tokyo/A1302/A130204/13256919/
❓ My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.0
๐ฑ Booking: ๐ฉ Bookings for a dinner course menu are required - book a few days in advance. Walk-ins for lunch or the bistro menu are accepted if there are seats available but as the restaurant is very small it's better to call ahead to avoid a wasted journey.
๐ Location:
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