Daichi Ebato Put Bread on the Kaiseki Menu at One Bryant Park

On Thursday, dinner started at 135 West 42nd Street, in the rooms that had been Aureole, at the base of the Bank of America Tower. The meal is kaiseki, small courses that follow the season. The baker grew up in New York. His name is Daichi Ebato. He has worked the ovens at Runner & Stone and at Hot Bread Kitchen. “Being Japanese American was always a big part of my identity,” he told Grub Street. For this menu he is baking Hokkaido brown mochi rice with stone-ground wheat, in a clay pot. “I really wanted that perfect balance of ‘It’s bread but it’s also rice.’”

There is a box for the end of the meal, too. Grub Street described a walnut and red-bean anpan, a black-and-white melon pan, and a small buckwheat focaccia with shishito.

The dining room is called One Bryant Park. Tadaaki Ishizaki directs it. He held the same job at Odo, the Flatiron kaiseki counter where chef Hiroki Odo holds two Michelin stars, and he cooked at Joël Robuchon’s château restaurant. Shuji Furukawa cooks the room. He was executive chef at Restaurant Yuu in Brooklyn, and at Kyo Ya before that. Sixty seats in the dining room, twenty at the bar. Dinner is Tuesday through Saturday, from 5 to 10.

Yoshihiko Kousaka opened Kumiko Room the same night. It is a 14-seat sushi counter, with its own reservation. He was head sushi chef at Jewel Bako for eleven years, then opened Kosaka. The 2019 Michelin guide gave Kosaka a star. Masatomo Soma, who apprenticed with Kousaka for thirty years, is the chef at Kosaka now.

Chikara Sono is the one still moving in. Kappo Sono is his kaiseki counter from the East Village. Eater has the opening here in mid-November.

KwangHo Lee, who also runs Momoya, told Crain’s in September that Ishizaki, Kousaka, and Sono each deserved a room of their own. On October 7, Grub Street priced the meal at $175 for five courses and $265 for eleven, with Ebato’s bread in both. You can book the dining room and Kumiko Room now.