Skip to main content You are hereHomePondering two food documentaries: Jiro Dreams of Sushi and Kings of Pastry Pondering two food documentaries: Jiro Dreams of Sushi and Kings of PastryThe quintessential “lifestyle” documentary, Jiro Dreams of Sushi combines a profile of a celebrity chef, a quick cultural immersion and many mouth-watering montages of food preparation in one package. Akin to one of The New Yorker’s vintage profiles, the film begins with a few attention-grabbing facts about its subject and gradually adds layers of broader and deeper context, touching on persona,, family and the esthetic and culinary traditions of Japan. The star is Jiro Ono, a revered 85-year-old sushi chef who runs Sukiyabashi Jiro, a 10-seat restaurant in the basement of an office building adjacent to the Ginza subway station in Tokyo. In spite of its location, Sukiyabashi Jiro has a three-star Michelin rating as one of the finest restaurants in the world. Reservations must be made a month in advance and meals start at $300 a person.

We know this when an out-of-towner bumbles into the unprepossessing restaurant, wondering if they have any take-out menus. When he’s told the price and reservation wait, he backs out bowing quickly. We know how great the restaurant is from Tokyo food critic Masuhiro Yamamoto, who declares that no other restaurant in Tokyo can compare: “No one ever has a bad experience there,” he says. The standard course, without the distractions of alcohol or main courses, is a 20-piece symphony of sushi from mild to increasing complex tastes, guided by traditional rules of extreme simplicity (no sushi pizzas here) and precision. Fish slices are lightly brushed with soy sauce and wasabi. There are three kinds of tuna, of different degrees of fatness. Shrimp are killed moments before being served. Jiro has his own rice dealer, who refuses to sell to the top hotels because they wouldn’t know what to do with his quality of rice. The egg tuna that serves as desert is an art form in itself: One of the kitchen cooks said he took months before his first piece was accepted.

The film is a portrait of the artisan ( shokunin) as an old man. At work since he was 9, Ono is a former soldier who, since he first apprenticed as a chef, has dreamed about ways to improve sushi. He obsesses about improving his craft by getting the best ingredients, massaging the octopus 40 minutes instead of 30, and experimenting to find exactly the right serving temperature. What else is the film about? The traditional, and sometimes negative obsession with dedication and sacrifice. Ono is proudly tough, a workaholic, who says he derives a kind of ecstasy from work, which depends on others sacrificing for him. At 70 he had a heart attack and decided that, perhaps, it was time to let his sons buy fish from the market for him. The shadow of mortality convinced him he had to delegate some responsibilities. He apparently has a wife because we see her in a photograph. He chuckles when he recounts that, on the rare day he stayed home, his sons used to wonder who the strange man was sleeping in his mother’s bed.

And of course, the sacrifice is also imposed on others. The youngest son, Takashi, runs his own cheaper branch of the restaurant in the tourist-friendly Roppongi Hills, while the oldest son Yoshikazu, now in his late 50s, patiently waits to inherit the business. As a young man he dreamed of racing cars. Now he rides a bicycle to the market each day, to negotiate with an elite fraternity of top fish dealers, who save their best for Jiri’s restaurant. jiro dreams of sushi polskie napisyLike the fish that are disappearing from the oceans, they’re probably the last of a breed. ichiban sushi menu la canadaAnd at night, Yoshikazu and his father stand behind the counter scrutinizing their customers, who are eating their art, bite after perfect bite.where to buy sushi grade fish in toronto

Jiro Dreams Of SushiSukiyabashi JiroSushi AsianJapanese DreamJapanese FoodExotic FoodFood Food FoodFood PornFattiest CutForwardO Toro in Jiro Dreams of SushiYou are in > > > Ex–Jiro Student Dreams of Being the Best Sushi Chef in America Ex–Jiro Student Dreams of Being the Best Sushi Chef in America on September 21, 2016 There can’t be many better ways to hone the craft of fine sushi–making than by serving an apprenticeship under Jiro Ono, the revered chef of Jiro Dreams of Sushi fame.sushi online bestellen apeldoorn That’s exactly what chef Daisuke Nakazawa did – for 11 years. Nakazawa now co-owns Sushi Nakazawa in Manhattan’s West Village, which has been awarded four stars by The New York Times. Watching him in action in the video from Vice Munchies below we see the kind of attention to detail such prestigious training instils in you and like Jiro’s three star Sukiyabashi Jiro restaurant in Tokyo, the absence of choice for the customer is a signature at Sushi Nakazawa.

Nakazawa says he dreams of becoming the best sushi chef in America and even had “I will be the number one chef in America” written on his door whilst living in Seattle, before coming to New York. Despite the high–end food he produces however, Nakazawa now has a penchant for cheeseburgers and New York City pizza. Interestingly, we discover that Nakazawa and his business partner Alessandro Borgognone met after the latter had watched Jiro Dreams of Sushi, in which the former features, and decided to approach him via Facebook about opening a restaurant. And the rest is history. Watch the revealing interview below. Customer orders cooked sushi at world's best sushi bar Follow Fine Dining Lovers on FacebookIn pitching his six-part docu-series, “Chef’s Table," which debuts April 26 on Netflix, creator David Gelb’s bestselling point was “Jiro Dreams of Sushi,” his 2011 documentary about Tokyo’s most esteemed sushi master, Jiro Ono.Gelb’s promise — to have each of the half-dozen episodes focus on a successful chef with a life story as compelling, doubt-filled and quirk-riddled as Ono’s — is aptly borne out in the cast of characters assembled.

Niki Nakayama of n/naka represents Los Angeles; Attica Restaurant's Ben Shewry is from Melbourne, Australia; and Magnus Nilsson built his reputation in the remote town of Jarpen, Sweden. Other episodes of “Chef’s Table” will focus on New York’s Dan Barber of Blue Hill Restaurant at Stone Barns and Manhattan, Italy’s Massimo Bottura of Francescana in Modena, and Argentina’s Francis Mallmann. Recently we caught up with Gelb to talk about finding the subjects for “Chef’s Table,” why Bottura’s bullying older brothers can take partial credit for one of his most famous dishes and how “Chef’s Table” and shows such as Bravo’s “Top Chef” have less in common than you’d think. How is “Chef’s Table” different from the dozens of other food-centric television shows? We don’t have a host or a competition format. Each episode is its own documentary and it puts a big burden on the filmmakers to keep it compelling for 45 minutes. How many people did you go through before ending up with the six you chose? 

We have a binder full of chefs. There are so many awesome chefs in the world right now and they all have incredible stories so it was really a matter of who’s available and willing to give us the time that we need to go in depth.What sorts of things did you keep in mind while narrowing the field? We wanted the chefs to be pretty much obsessed with what they’re doing. We didn’t want chefs who have a ton of restaurants but who are really focused on the restaurants they do have and are trying to make them perfect. We wanted chefs who mastered the fundamentals, then broke the rules of tradition and made their own cuisine. We also wanted chefs who are in different places in their careers.How far-flung is the range of experience and scope? Massimo Bottura is ranked the No. 3 chef in the world, has three Michelin stars and kind of reinvented the traditional cuisine of Modena, Italy. Niki Nakayama isn’t as well-known on the international scene but she’s an incredible talent, a kind of up-and-comer in Los Angeles who has a completely different take on kaiseki.

Dan Barber pioneered the whole farm-to-table movement and is very much an intellectual chef. Francis Mallmann is all about the aesthetic — his fires and his plates are incredibly beautiful. He doesn’t even really work in a restaurant because he can’t be contained — he just wants to wander through the hills of Patagonia making beautiful fires.What part did their specific dishes play in driving the narrative? To start out, we tried to have a tasting course or eat a bunch of the food to see what it looked like. Then we’d talk to the chefs about which dishes had the most compelling stories. Everything in this series is extremely character driven. We featured the dishes that come from a very personal place in the chef.When Massimo Bottura was a kid his older brothers would chase him around the house because he was the runt of the litter. He’d always end up hiding under a table in the kitchen where his grandmother was making tortellini by hand. She’d defend him with her rolling pin, tell his brothers to get lost.

He has this incredibly fond memory of being under the table, seeing the world from this different perspective and stealing tortellini.So he created a dish called “Tortellini Walking On Broth.” Traditionally, tortellini is maybe 10 to a spoonful. But on this plate he had only six pieces of tortellini so that the eater can appreciate each one. It’s not just about being full or it being delicious, it’s also about the idea behind the food. He’s very much a storyteller through his food. This is really true of all of our chefs.Your father is the general manager of New York’s Metropolitan Opera. Do you think that had something to do with the prominent role that classical music plays in your documentaries? I’m very much influenced by my parents. Before my father was the manager of the Metropolitan Opera, he was the manager of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and he was the leader of the Sony Classical Record label. He always worked with very obsessive artists in the music world.He’d take me on his trips.

I went with him to Japan as a kid, which is one of the reasons I was obsessed with sushi. My mom is a recipe chef and a writer for cookbooks. She and Peter Kaminsky worked with Francis on his cookbook, “Seven Fires,” and his new book, “Mallmann on Fire.”Making “Chef’s Table” must have been like an immersion course in fine cooking. What did you learn?I learned so much about ingredients — like understanding what a piece of high-quality Parmigiano-Reggiano tastes like or what a true balsamic vinegar is. Massimo Bottura’s balsamic vinegar, the finest you can buy in a store, is available at Whole Foods. It’s called Villa Manodori. It turns out that my dad has been using that vinegar when he cooks since I was 13 years old. Finding that out really threw me for a loop.What types of foods film best? With our cameras and lenses and the way we frame it we can pretty much make anything look relatively delicious. The challenge was always, “How do I make it feel like the viewer is there?”