All about taste

Richard Ekkebus may be a bright star on Hong Kong's fine-dining scene, but the farm-raised Dutch chef believes that without flavor a pretty dish is nothing, Mike Peters and Xu Junqian report.

The Ebisu oyster was a last-minute menu addition by Richard Ekkebus, and his guest was agog: "This had been cooked in its shell at 67 degrees and was served with wilted tarragon, shallots, duck gizzard, pieds de moutons mushroom and vin jaune. It was truly a jaw-dropping dish that married European and Asian techniques."

It was the best dish of the night, the reviewer exclaimed in 2013. But Ekkebus, the culinary director of the Landmark Mandarin Oriental in Hong Kong who has made Amber a two-Michelin-starred gem, is not one to rest on such laurels.

On a recent visit to Amber, the oyster was on the menu, but in completely different form: coagulated at 70 C with sake lees, lemon, Granny Smith apple and salicornia. Next came an out-of-this-world Normandy diver scallop seared with lime caviar, umami sabayon, crispy Camargue red rice and dried seafood.

Such menu items sound so posh that you might imagine Ekkebus to be one of those chefs who have gone off the molecular deep-end. No way. When his wagyu beef dish arrives at your table, you will not have to poke various piles of powder to guess which one was once a Japanese cow. His success may lie in his ability to be both so elegant and so elemental.

Ekkebus was raised in a fishermen's village in southwestern Netherlands.

"The time growing up in the countryside set my 'hard disk' for how food should taste," he told Four magazine in 2015. "What is the flavor of exceptionally fresh fish? How does a strawberry or tomato taste, picked straight from the vine? I say that kids that grew up with fish sticks and instant mashed potato cannot create any benchmarks for themselves."

Ekkebus spent his teen years peeling potatoes and cleaning mussels in his grandparents' restaurant, he said in that interview. Though his father initially discouraged him from entering the business, he soon found himself on track to be a chef.

Unlike in traditional French cuisine, Ekkebus keeps dishes light, fresh and innovative, and he draws on premium ingredients from all over the world.

But he's no snob in that regard.

On a recent visit to Shanghai, he tells China Daily: "Sometimes I find the ingredients here are better than what I source from Europe or Japan. The quality of the ingredients has considerably improved over the four years since I was here the first time."

Ekkebus concedes that you need to adapt: "You are not sitting on the farm or owning a restaurant in the farm. But I don't think there is much of a problem."

He says Hong Kong's open economy made it much easier and cheaper to import all kinds of ingredients. "But when I see promotions in Hong Kong for 'farm-to-table' concepts, I always want to ask them where the farm is. If there is anything Hong Kong is growing, it is growing buildings. Farming is left for financial guys who have gone bankrupt."

Ekkebus was in Shanghai for one of his consulting visits to the Mandarin Oriental's restaurant in Shanghai, which he finds rather liberating.

"For me, to do the Fifty 8?? Grill is really fun. The grill is the fun dining, while Amber is fine dining. We need 75 people to make Amber run. There are certain things you cannot do. It's just like fashion, which has both haute couture and pr??t ?? porter. For me, it's same with the cooking and very exciting to do both.

"For example, I don't get to do big steaks at Amber. But most of the time, it's not about what things I cannot put on your table, more a different style of cooking."

Hong Kong's Amber, in fact, has become a temple of modern French cuisine, winning both Michelin acclaim and perennial ranking on best-restaurant lists.

Signature dishes of the moment from Team Ekkebus include "Miyazaki wagyu beef, strip loin, barbecued with dulse and red cabbage slaw, oxalis, horseradish and pepper berry emulsion" (HK$ 1,548 or $199). The star of the dessert list is "Kacinkoa 85 percent chocolate, ganache, Fisherman's Friend dust, peppermint and white chocolate sorbet" (HK$180).

The dining room, designed by Adam Tihany, features a dramatic double ceiling with 4,320 gold rods suspended overhead. The wine cellar boasts 1,100 labels, and a sommelier who knows how to match wines from the Old World and the New World with Ekkebus' creations.

After hovering at No 4 on the 50 Best Restaurants in Asia list for a while, Amber this year bumped up to No 3.

"I have no idea why," he says. "But I do know we have always been working very hard to stay relevant and not be complacent."

Amber, he says, is "a place that every time you go, you are wowed. It's like marrying a woman and not being bored 12 years later, because you work every day on your relationship."

The work was hardest at the outset 12 years ago, he says.

"At the beginning, people didn't like us in Hong Kong, thinking the restaurant was being too futuristic and untraditional. It took us three to four years to win the heart of the city."

Every week, he says, the restaurant team challenges the status quo.

"We question every element of the restaurant consistently - table finishing, napkins, plates, music. There are many things we try to evolve."

Contact the writer at michaelpeters@chinadaily.com.cn

Clockwise from top: Dombes frog legs; heirloom carrots, confit with orange blossom honey, carrot cake, zest and sorbet of blood orange; Blue Lobster Tail served raw with raw piglet head, cauliflower, couscous and caviar; Miyazaki wagyu beef, strip loin, barbecued with dulse and red cabbage slaw; Hokkaido corn, icecream over a coconut mousse with salted caramel and roasted peanuts. Photos Provided To China Daily