NIJU London. Experience Fine Japanese Fusion Fare.

Anthea Gerrie Enjoys Homegrown Sushi And Wagyu Beef At NIJU, London’s New Japanese Fusion Fine Dining Experience

Dinner at NIJU London, just down the street from where Nobu Matsuhiso first brought Japanese dining with a sophisticated twist to Mayfair, was as pleasurable and surprisingly multi-cultural as that first taste of Nipponese fusion cuisine we first enjoyed on Berkeley Street, a stroll from London’s Ritz Hotel, 20 years ago.

But there is really no comparison, for it’s UK produce which has most influenced Endo Kazutoshi rather than the Nikkei Peruvian cuisine which Matsuhiso made his own point of difference. Having paved the way for big-bucks, essentially Japanese feasting elevated to a more rarefied experience, it’s time for a more grounded chef not preoccupied with building a global empire to delight diners in his adopted country with new tricks.

For a heartier, more complex Japanese experience infused with what the finest homegrown producers can bring to the party, we have to thank restaurants of long standing Zuma and the River Cafe, where Kazutoshi, who already holds a Michelin star for his eponymous restaurant, Endo at the Rotunda, honed his skills after studying to become a sushi master in his native Japan and moving to the British capital.

Along the way, chef Endo discovered it’s not only Kobe which can provide fine, melt in the mouth, wagyu beef, and that chalk-stream trout yields roe as fine as as the tiny tobacco produced by flying fish.

There is also the challenge of a suitably sumptuous setting beyond the typical blonde wood and rattan of a typical Japanese dining room, although at NIJU London you have a choice once admitted to what seems like a private club by a friendly doorman and climbing the stairs to a lavish reception desk which separates two completely different dining environments.

On one side the look is all English private members’ club – beautiful and spacious with luxurious banquettes, but not quite at one with chopsticks and sushi counters, which come into view on the more traditionally Japanese side of the restaurant, making for a pared-back but rather more authentic setting.

The menu is similarly a story of two halves – traditional treats like sushi and sashimi prepared in front of diners by European chefs as highly-trained as those learning to cut and dress raw fish in Japan, and grilled meats which reinterpret NIJU as a steakhouse. But there is a third element – the Katei Ryori dishes which are the kind of confections found in Japanese homes rather than on restaurant menus, and served with their own fusion element – shiso salsa verde accompanying meat from the Konro grill, for example, and lobster from Scotland garnished with avocado as well as the more traditionally Japanese radish for another.

But NIJU London is not a restaurant to run into and place a quick order. For a start, diners will likely want a cocktail at lower level in Nipperkin, the restaurant’s speakeasy inspired by Japanese listening bars, where it was a surprise to find a martini fuelled with Japanese gin made in Cambridgeshire(the justification is in the botanicals) and decks for DJs.

Then there are the ageing cupboards to be inspected, not just the kind holding meat seen in every self-respecting fine steakhouse, but a companion ager for fish in which turbot, bonito and sea bass hang and incredibly high quality, blood-red tuna may be aged for up to 14 days.

NIJU London may be unique in offering not just regular tuna and the finer belly portion, toro, but two takes on the latter – chutoro or medium-fatty tuna belly, and full-fat toro, with the edge taken off and a touch of smoke added with a little fast searing before garnishing and serving. Hamachi or yellowtail is always de rigeur for sushi lovers, but succulent slices of masu – British chalk-stream trout – proved we have sushi-quality fish aplenty swimming through our rivers.

We were urged to try one of the creatively-conceived small dishes before getting to the sushi, and the most popular, slivers of grilled aubergine with a white miso dressing sized for two to share at £16, was a fine appetite-whetter. There is also an ambitious hamachi tartare with blood orange, tomato and shiso sorbet (£18), for those who don’t mind their yellowtail slightly adulterated with fresh, acid flavours.

Post-starters and sushi, we might have gone on to some of that superbly-showcased fish, but the hay-smoked bonito with tomato ponzu had all been snapped up – “when it’s gone, it’s gone” is a tenet of NIJU London – and however tempting roast Cornish turbot might have seemed, once the steak platter arrived for inspection, showcasing half a dozen different varieties of superbly-marbled beef, we were lost to the pescatarian cause.

There were not only two qualities of Japanese wagyu, but a British grass-fed variety as well as Japanese Fuji-wagyu cross-breed rib-eye. Starting at £60 per 100 grams and rising, a 300g British bone-in fillet looked like considerable value at £65 by comparison, even more so a 500g rib-eye “Boston chop” to share for £90. Japanese condiments make the dish special – grated fresh wasabi, ponzu, yukari salt and shiso salsa verde. We could also have satisfied our carnivorous soul with Cornish lamb cutlets, all of the meat cooked over Niju London’s proprietary charcoal mix of binchotan and cherry wood.

Coming back to that home cooking, distinctly cosy mains on the katei ryori list, designed do be shared, including a katsu half-chicken from a named farm(£48), a wagyu sukiyaki with cabbage, enoki mushroom and daikon radish( £80), miso-braised wagyu with Japanese artichokes (£65) and native lobster with bottarga and bisque (£85).

Three courses in, we could not imagine finding room for a dessert special enough to tempt us, but NIJU London is full of surprises, and their Japanese cheesecake, a beautiful and somehow light take on the original, was well worth making a pudding-hole for. Surely multiple Michelin stars must be coming next year to Niju London; it would be hard to find more interesting fusion food from a pukka Japanese chef in London.