RESTAURANT MECHA UMA, MANILA

The name Mecha Uma is a Japanese expression meaning absurd, unreasonably delicious and a good mess.

Mecha Uma was recently named by the World's 50 Best Restaurants as one of six trending restaurants to visit in Southeast Asia and Australasia. Chef Bruce Ricketts, who studied and worked in several restaurants in California, is largely inspired by Japan and Mexico which he translates into dishes with a "freestyle" eight-course tasting menu where only the names of the ingredients are presented to the guests on a piece of paper. A dish that's simply listed as Toast is homemade potato bread soaked in miso and topped with shirako(cod sperm), an eggplant ceviche and ponzumarinated radish.

We started with a cocktail consisting of sake, sudachi, shiso leave and baby cucumber. So refreshing and more sour than sweet, which I like about cocktails. It had a pompous name as well: Battle Royale.

The first dish was the Toast with foie gras that I already mentioned...wowwowwow...decadent and delicious...I would have no problem eating one every day!

Dish number two: fish, crispies, barley, smoked eggplant, red kale, wasabi and a very good broth. The crispies were a somewhat surprising element but overall a tasty fusion dish with a good texture.

Number three: scallop, squid, seaweed, lamb, chipotle, black tacos. Beautiful colours and interesting flavours for your tastebuds.

Number four: onion that had been prepared sous vide overnight and then fried and squeezed, clams and egg. Splendid dish so full of nice aromas and the  taste of onion was absolutely sensational.

Number five: fish(golden eye snapper), edamame and white sauce.

Number six: marinated tuna sushi which was very tasty. The second sushi was smoked tunabelly , also marinated . It was so good and quite different in taste from the first one because different parts of the tuna were used... and I forgot to take a picture.

Number seven: pigeon(foot and breast), soymilk, rice, parmesan, dashi sauce, yuzu and scalion(green herb). Also great in taste and the sauce was to die for.

Number eight, the dessert: blue cheese, vanilla ice cream, grapes, nuts. Interesting combination that I would never think of trying at home but it actually worked quite well because the portion was small enough!

And we chose a bottle of this sparkling demi-sec wine, which accompanied the sweet, sour and crunchy elements in the dishes surprisingly well!

And here is the excellent chef and owner himself: Bruce Ricketts. I have never seen a chef as dedicated to his creations...he explained all the techniques and ingredients to the clients sitting at the chef's table around the kitchen. Unfortunately we didn't belong to that group because we reserved our table the day before and all the ten seats were already taken. Not a problem but it would have been interesting to listen to the chef 's explanations...the staff performed well enough so no complaints.

 The dining room is small: seating only 20 people. Wood frames hang from the ceiling and that's about all decoration there is; quite minimalistic and Japanese.
And one more thing: the chef has no stand-in, which of course means that he works every night. Not open for lunch but two dinner seatings: one at 18.00 and the other at 20.30. Tough job!

www.mechauma.ph