Occupy Amber: vegetarian prima donna

It's that day of the year when we go out for a nice vegetarian dinner. For the fourth year in a row, I defaulted to Amber for the special occasion. We have always enjoyed our meals here, and I didn't think there was any reason for us to change this tradition.

While we have opted for the lighter, 6-course option in previous years, Foursheets feared that I would go home hungry - something that has never happened on any visit here. So 8-courses it is...

It has been too long since I last saw Richard Ekkebus, and he seemed very excited about the upcoming expansion of the hotel and the new additional outlets they have planned. We look forward to trying them in the not-so-distant future.

Shiso sherbet - with perilla leaves on top. Unfortunately I was clumsy and squeezed a little too hard, which split the sphere into two halves... leading to the liquid center to leak all over the place. Sigh.

The kombucha was made with tomatoes and jalapeño oil.

Soy panna cotta - topped with bell peppers and tomato mousse.

The gelée at the bottom came with Sichuan peppercorn oil, which brought that wonderful fragrance as well as a slight tingling sensation on the tongue.

Heirloom tomato ˚ strawberry ˚ AN soymilk ‘burrata’ ˚ rose ˚ lemon verbena ˚ extra virgin olive oil ˚ - my second time with this dish, although there has been some changes made since last year. The heirloom tomatoes from Japan - I didn't know they existed in Japan - and the strawberries were nice. I'm still not a fan of the imitation burrata made with soy milk, because I don't like the texture or the aftertaste it left in my mouth. Not sure what has changed but my objection last year wasn't over the flavors - just the texture. In any case, the use of olive oil pearls (I'm no longer calling it 'caviar') or the rose and lemon verbena jelly didn't manage to salvage the dish. Had the kitchen chosen to leave out the soy altogether and presented the rest of the ingredients, I have no doubt I would have loved this dish.

Tonburi ˚ potato ˚ leek ˚ wakame ˚ horseradish ˚ - so there's a leek and potato foam here that was described as 'vichyssoise', sitting on top of a layer of chilled and crunchy leeks and a leek gelée with citrus flavor. We've got a crisp on top made with burnt leek ash.

The summer cypress seeds (とんぶり) were actually inside the foam, not at the bottom of the dish as described.

This was nice and refreshing, but I couldn't help but wonder why the seeds - together with diced wakame (若布) - had to be part of the dish... until I realized this was the vegetarian equivalent of the iconic sea urchin and cauliflower dish where the caviar is a star.

I was pretty happy to see the arrival of the sourdough, but my real excitement lay in the item that came with the bread...

...which was the vegan plant-based brown butter. This is still fucking beautiful, and yeah... I polished off the first quenelle in no time, so I had most of Foursheets' portion, too, before they gave me a second quenelle of my own.

1 year aged Acquerello carnaroli rice ˚ lacto fermented cashew nut butter ˚ togarashi ˚ shiro Koji ˚ summer squash ˚ coconut ˚ - a cheese-less risotto made with coconut milk, topped with both pickled summer squash as well as squash that seems to have been dehydrated before being re-hydrated during cooking.

I didn't particularly notice the togarashi (唐辛子), but the acidity from the pickles worked well with both the sweetness and the rich, creamy texture. A very nice dish.

For the next dish, we were once again invited to have it served inside the kitchen... so we had Terry put this together for us.

Kabu ˚ sugar pea ˚ seaweed ˚ plankton ˚ oyster leaf ˚ - we've got a sauce made with the kombu dashi (昆布出汁) used to cook the turnip, plankton, seaweed such as kelp and wakame... and lots of sugar snap peas. I'm a happy camper any time I get to have sweet peas in season.

The layers of turnip and kelp came topped with some oyster leaves and sea grapes. I really loved the flavors from all the different types of seaweed and plankton, which ended up being complex and layered. Hands down my favorite dish of the meal.

Cevenne onion ˚ girolles mushroom ˚ Western Australian winter truffle ˚ vin jaune ˚ sorrel ˚ - the Cévennes onion was cooked in salt to really bring out the sweetness, and came with some girolles, sorrel, along with white onion foam. A thin 'onion chip' came as decorative garnish.

It was then topped with shavings of Australian winter truffle. This was, of course, very straightforward and delicious. The onion was very sweet as expected, and the sorrel added a little acidity, along with the balsamic that brought both acidity and richness.

Violin zucchini ˚ green tomato ˚ shishito pepper ˚ green Castelvetrano olive ˚ pistachio ˚ ‘Per Me’ Manni extra virgin olive oil ˚ - I remembered the beautiful zucchini from 3 years ago, but alas, this was not that dish. The zucchini had been grilled, split length-wise, then tied back with very thin strips of chives. I'm not sure why they went through this much trouble, but Fousheets told me that the zucchini had been stuffed with a small amount of olives - which I apparently missed. On top of the zucchini - as well as on the side - there were thin discs of poached zucchini sandwiching some minced Castelvetrano olives, the latter of which was rather salty and needed the zucchini for balance. The green tomatoes and cucumber flowers were nice, but unfortunately the green tomato sabayon was way too acidic for my liking. In any case, the zucchini was perfectly sweet and beautiful on its own.

We are no strangers to this restaurant, and the service staff came to reconfirm our dietary requirements before the meal started. Having already been labeled years ago as a PRIMA DONNA in the restaurant's internal system, we were sure that there would be no surprises on this front. We were wrong.

Golden Diamond pineapple ˚ Akita Komachi rice ˚ junmai sake ˚ sake leese ˚ matcha ˚ rice milk ˚ - the kitchen knows Foursheets doesn't like beetroot so they offered her an alternative, but both of us were stunned speechless when this arrived. They are also aware of her issue of caffeine - which we had confirmed at the start tonight - but somehow served her a dessert with matcha... FACEPALM. She did nibble on the pineapple millefeuille before giving the rest of this dessert to me. This was OK.

Blackberry ˚ Beetroot ˚ 10 Years Old Aceto Balsamic Vinegar ˚ Purple Shiso ˚ Red Quinoa ˚ - how is it that the kitchen missed the fact that BOTH OF US hate beetroot, instead of just Foursheets? This isn't exactly a secret. Every restaurant that has a long-standing relationship with us knows this, but we have a dessert with beetroot in front of me... Anyway, I took a spoonful of the acidic blackberry and perilla sorbet and gave up.

Vegan milk chocolate ˚ coconut ˚ peanut ˚ custard apple ˚ Arbequina extra virgin olive oil ˚ - this was Foursheets' substitute dessert. I did love the candied peanuts at the bottom here, and not surprisingly we've got some yuba (湯葉) at the bottom.

I couldn't really taste the custard apple that was in the middle. Oh well.

Bitter chocolate 65% cocoa ˚ banana ˚ passionfruit ˚ arabica ˚ avocado ˚ fermented cocoa mucilage ˚ - unfortunately I was too busy taking pics of Foursheets' dessert and waited too long... so the arabica coffee ice cream on top started to melt... I do love that ice cream, as it really packs a punch in terms of flavors - and maybe caffeine?

Inside the chocolate mousse we had passion fruit and banana center.

Now we were ready for the mignardises...

The French melon was very ripe and sweet, with a lovely fragrance. The local organic figs were nice, and Japanese grapes were sweet as expected.

Peach tartlet with almond mousse and a lavender tuile on top.

Madeleine - with poppy seeds and a filling of black lemon.

Ambershu

Richard very kindly offered us a glass of Champagne to start:

Vilmart Grande Réserve, dégorgée en Juin 2018 - the nose was a little yeasty. Pretty good acidity here, especially on the back end. Turns more ripe and actually a little bitter after a bite of the soy burrata.

They seemed to have changed their corkaage policy, so I decided not to BYO and ordered a bottle from the restaurant wine list...

2016 Anne et Jean-François Ganevat Montferrand - started drinking about 30 minutes after opening. The acidity was definitely front and center, and it was actually a little tannic. The nose, though, was pretty ripe and sweet, and very aromatic.

We were offered a glass of dessert wine as an apology for the dessert mix-up, so I indulged myself:

2009 Coutet - fragrance of orange blossom water and marmalade here. Good amount of sweetness on the palate.

We were, once again, grateful to have the opportunity to come here for the vegetarian option on this special day. While there were some dishes which didn't appeal to my palate, I always admire Richard, Terry, and the team for their creativity.