Whitebook: Shaun Hergatt

Calling Forth The Seasons Is Juni a garden or restaurant? Everywhere you look, fragrances, essences and fresh summer flavours burst from the seams of highy acclaimed chef Shaun Hergatt’s imagination, tempting all senses.

In his secret garden, Hergatt has set up a culinary easel on which he handpicks only the freshest ingredients of the season to be part of his exquisite epicurean landscape. Assembled with unfaltering passion and futuristic creativity, this luscious gallery of refreshing botanical dishes evokes the heart of the season, just as the restaurant’s name is Latin for June, the entrée into summer.

"By the time you leave you should have a sense of wellbeing, and you should understand why the concept is season," promises Hergatt.

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Bounty of the Harvest

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Painting Palates Juni is a timeless 55-seat boutique restaurant in New York's Hotel Chandler, a few blocks from the iconic Grand Central Terminal. It is an elegantly relaxed space in Murray Hill, serene and gracious, separated into two rooms where the front seats 20 under a high Venetian-arched ceiling and green copper mirrors decorated in earth tones, while the second houses exposed beams, leather banquettes and silver patina mirrors.

Hergatt found the perfect partner in artist Carol Dunn, who interprets his plentiful garden ideology in her Harvest Bounty series lining the restaurant walls, Hergatt's presentations are composed in colours that reflect the spring, summer, fall and winter, playfully orchestrating elements such as sunny yellow corn, fresh snow cream, dark purple plums and fuchsia flowers in beautifully plated symphonies. Gastronomic artifice is refreshingly lacking, and ingredients never compromised; everything is left as crisp as their moment of harvest. This philosophy allows Hergatt to adapt and evolve his menu based on sourcing availability and quality, and bursts of inspiration. At Juni, anticipating the unexpected is part of the dining experience, for Hergatt is known to only satiate his guests with single-minded excellence. In this mix, black mission figs, young beets, quail eggs and crispy-skin branzino with carrot puree make regular appearances, all delivered at their finest from the most trusted farms that take rearing and prepping produce as seriously as Hergatt does. The chef’s

Cul inary Artistry down-to-earth approach to haute cuisine is evident in his Warm Pork Soup; humble by name

when in reality an elegant plate filled with smoky shards of pork paired with a slow reduction of

Tuscan kale brought down to a deep forest green. Topped with a golden egg yolk that quivers perfectly,

these simple ingredients seem wildly cast together yet completely calculated to exact sensuous magic.

A Personalized Menu

Inspired by Natural Beauty and Flavor

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Claiming one Michelin star and Esquire’s 2013 Best New Restaurant, Juni has undisputedly won over the hearts and palates of the world’s fussiest and most discerning gourmands. Hergatt began his career in his hometown of Cairns, Australia, where he was enamoured with cooking from an early age, influenced his father and Scandinavian grandmother, both formidable masters in the kitchen. At the age of 17 just before high school graduation, Hergatt pursued a four-year apprenticeship at Crystal Twig, a local fine dining restaurant where he was trained in classical French cooking. He then landed in Sydney, where he experienced firsthand a wealth of international ingredients. In 2000, he joined Atelier at The Ritz Carlton New York, Central Park as chef de cuisine; during his tenure, the restaurant received a James Beard nomination for Best New Restaurant and earned a three-star rating from The New York Times. In 2009, Hergatt opened his first namesake restaurant in the Financial District, garnering two Michelin stars before closing that chapter so Juni could take root. At SHO Shaun Hergatt, the chef learned from “the local guys – farmers,” and now with Juni blooming beneath the Empire State Building, he hopes to capture fluid nature always at its peak, endowing diners with his unique concept of sequencing tastes and textures in harmonious consonance.

Text = Nicole Chan

Ripe For Excellence

Shaun

S imple Elegance and

Mono

Hergatt chromatic Ae sthetic

★ Shaun Hergatt ★

Born in Cairns, Australia, chef Shaun Hergatt became chef de cuisine of The Dining Room at The Ritz-Carlton, Sydney, where he quickly earned national and international accolades including an AHA “Best Young Chef” award. In 2000, Hergatt moved to the United States and joined Atelier at The Ritz-Carlton New York, Central Park as chef de cuisine and in 2005 became executive chef at The Setai in Miami. He returned to New York in 2009 to open his eponymous restaurant SHO Shaun Hergatt, receiving two Michelin stars, a 29 out of 30 Zagat rating across the board and Best New Restaurant accolades from Esquire and New York magazines.

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