Three seasons

RESTAURANTS • First Person

After a decade of haute sushi openings in New York, it’s kaiseki’s turn. The Japanese style of dining — in which chefs pay tribute to the season through multi-course menus of small dishes prepared in a variety cooking methods with diversity in color, flavor, texture, and temperature — is on offer at these three exemplary counter-style spots that opened in roughly the last year (including one that just opened last week):

NEW KID: Isao Yamada famously ran David Bouley’s Brushstoke for seven years, and some of the French technique he picked up there is on display at his brand-new counter, Yamada (above). See, especially, the foie gras chawanmushi with king crab and Hokkaido uni. It’s the second of ten courses on his tasting menu ($300 per), which debuted last week. The restaurant abuts sibling Kooth Hospitality spots Kono and Nakaji, each of which sit behind nearly unmarked doors along Chinatown’s Canal Arcade.

Yamada’s classically Japanese space is dressed in the requisite earth-toned minimalism, with a 10-seat hinoki counter anchored by a central white quartzite island. While some kaiseki experiences test Western palates with unfamiliar ingredients (e.g., squid guts, monkfish liver), Yamada’s is more of a people pleaser, with its fatty, umami-laced ingredients in dishes like silky sweet gyokuro tea and soy sauce-marinated fatty otoro bluefin over rice. Yamada’s five-day sakura leaf-aged A5 wagyu, kissed with subtle nutty-vanilla flavor, is an immediate contender for best wagyu preparation in the city.

→ Yamada (Chinatown) • 16 Elizabeth St • Tue-Sat, seatings @ 530p & 830p • Reserve.

REAL DEAL: In Japan, it’s common for restaurants and bars to be discreetly tucked away on random floors of unassuming buildings. Getting lost is part of the adventure. Perched as it is on the sixth floor of an unmarked office building just off Union Square, Kappo Sono perfectly captures this transportive, uniquely Japanese charm. As the elevator opens, you’ll step into what feels like an apartment living room outfitted with a 12-seat L-shaped dining counter, complimented by a view of Union Square.

Behind that counter works Chikara Sono, one of the city’s OG kaiseki masters, best known for his 13-year tenure at the highly acclaimed Kyo Ya, which shuttered in 2020. As at Kyo Ya, the experience at Kappo Sono is deeply Japanese, entrenched in hyper-seasonal delicacies like slippery, chilled raw octopus roe in dashi and a kombu and ginger-flavored soft-shell turtle soup.

If you dine on a Friday or Saturday, you’re in for the full $350 omakase — an immersive three-hour, 11-course journey. (An abridged nine-course menu is available on Wednesdays and Thursdays for $285 per.) If you’re in the market for a dining experience that feels wholly transportive to Japan, this is it.

→ Kappo Sono (Union Square) • 39 E 13th St • Wed-Sat, seating @ 630p • Reserve.

STEER AUSTERE: A sleek and polished eight-seat kaiseki enclave in the basement of Midtown’s revamped The Prince Kitano New York hotel, Hakubai is also a very Japanese-feeling place, serving a high-level, traditional menu with exceptional ingredients (nine courses, $250 per). The space, which also includes seating along two U-shaped banquettes, has an impersonal sparseness and austerity to it in line with the aesthetic (and sometimes, energy) encountered in Japan, especially in hotel restaurants. It’s a unique cultural element that, in a good way, reminded me of being there.

Behind the counter, the team moves slowly, working around each other like animated puzzle pieces, hunched over tiny gold leaf-shaped dishes holding the first course: an amuse built from a short stack of slippery botan ebi (shrimp), sakuradai (cherry sea bream), and pickled turnips, finished with spinach oil and bits of finger lime. Next, a triptych of small seasonal bites: egg yolk yellow vinegar miso sauce with poached and grilled squid; yuba with ikura and a sweet gold leaf-annointed black bean; and dashi-simmered whelk topped with sansho. A show-stopping uni chawanmushi follows, the egg custard just barely held together and topped with creamy uni sauce, fresh uni, and a goji berry, which disintegrates in your mouth. It’s spectacular, perhaps the best version of this very common dish I’ve ever had. –Kat Odell

→ Hakubai (Midtown) • 66 Park Ave • Tue-Sat 530-10p • Reserve.