WORLD’S FINEST RESTAURANTS

RESTAURANTS WE COVET

THE WORLD’S FINEST LUXURY RESTAURANTS

Fine dining restaurants are worldwide recognized for their excellence in food, service, and ambience. The menus feature dishes that are filled with creativity and artistry of the chef, which translates into the art that is very visible on the plate. The service of these spaces is attentive but not intrusive and the incredible wine lists complement the menu in perfect harmony. Here are the restaurants we’re still dreaming about.

ATOMIX

New York, USA

A card is set down in front of you before each new course arrives at Atomix, the tasting-menu restaurant in Murray Hill run by Junghyun Park and his wife, Jeungeun. Each is printed with a boldface transliteration of a Korean word under an abstract design of geometric shapes and lines. They look like flashcards from a school run by progressive graphic designers.

One of the city’s most acclaimed and extravagant openings of 2018 has become even more expensive. Atomix, Ellia Park and Junghyun Park’s chef’s counter spot that earned three Eater stars, three NYT stars, a Michelin star, and a best new restaurant nod, has officially joined the two-hundred-dollar club. The Chef’s Counter is an intimate and personable experience featuring a U-shaped counter and an up-close look at their open kitchen. Ato, stemming from the ancient Korean word for ‘gift,’ is the innovative cuisine that husband and wife team - Chef Junghyun and manager Ellia Park, hope to deliver to the world using New York City as their stage.

Atomix, a follow-up to their well-loved firstborn Atoboy, is a place where guests can really dive deep into Chef Park’s cuisine through a tasting menu that is inspired by Korean traditions and technique. Dinner here is as close as any meal in recent memory has come to be a poem. Each dish at Manhattan’s Atomix pleases the senses and comes with a menu card articulating its inspiration and how it’s rooted in Korean culinary history.

BORAGÓ

Santiago, Chile

Zero-kilometre sourcing and indigenous ingredients set apart this Chilean showstopper.

Considered the best restaurant in Chile and the 4th best in Latin America by The 50’s Best, Boragó is at least peculiar. In front of the kitchen is chef Rodolfo Guzmán, dedicated to the use of endemic products from Chile, his authorial and avant-garde cuisine can be considered unique. Boragó plates the full spectrum of Chile’s broad diversity, with Chef Rodolfo Guzmán hunting ingredients from the northern Atacama desert to deepest Patagonia in the south to unearth forgotten or often-ignored produce. He works directly with 200 foraging communities and small producers to bring ultra-seasonal ingredients to the table via his Endémica menu; his cooks gather from the nearby coastline and mountains most days and the menu is formed depending on what arrives at his door on the day. The intention of the place is to reflect what the land offers, bring the best products from unusual parts of the planet, and make your dishes something priceless. In the lounge and kitchen, the chef, maitre d ‘, waiters and cooks seem to dance a ballet choreographed to exhaustion. Everything seems to work perfectly! Customers not

only see how the kitchen works but interact with the cooks who act as waiters, taking the dishes to the table to explain them. The highly artistic Roasted Flowers à la Van Gogh, which includes false morels cooked in a seaweed bladder, turns flora and algae on their head. The adorable Black Sheep of the Family cake adheres to Boragó’s seasonal philosophy, and is made with plums, sheep’s milk and arrayán, a wild fruit available just one month of the year. In line with zero-kilometre cooking, many vegetables are grown in Boragó’s own orchard, located just 30 minutes from the restaurant and cooks are encouraged to get involved from planting to harvest. Guzmán also clinched Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants’ first Sustainable Restaurant Award in 2018. This new recognition of Boragó is the result of several years of work, tracking and research on endemic products from all over Chile. That has it as a favourite place for chefs and foreigners visiting the country, including Joan Roca, the Catalan chef considered the best in the world, who usually visits it when he comes to Chile.

ROTE WAND CHEF’S TABLE

Schulhaus, Lech, Áustria

Culinary specialities are extraordinaire in the Rote Wand Schualhus.

Built-in 1780, Zug’s old schoolhouse accommodated the alpine dairy and the school for a long time. Today, all those looking for culinary delights that are in a class of their own have come to the right place at our Schualhus: they can try the Rote Wand Chef’s Table. Max Natmessnig has been the “form teacher” for providing extra tuition in gourmet experiences at the Rote Wand Chef’s Table in the Schualhus since 2017. The native Lower Austrian has cooked his way from the “Steirereck” in Vienna to the “Oud Sluis” three-star temple in the Netherlands through to the “Chef’s Table at Brooklyn Fare” in New York in less than 10 years. From the very front row, you experience at the Chef’s Table in Zug’s old schoolhouse how the Rolling Pin climber of the year and his chefs Daniel, Julian and Jakob compose, create, stage, dress and serve a meal of between 16 and 19 courses made from mainly regional products before your very eyes. Accompanied by corresponding drinks at every

course, an unforgettable gourmet experience is created at the Rote Wand Chef’s Table – second to none in the Alps. Incidentally, the 4 toques restaurant has lately been awarded by Falstaff Restaurant guide with a sensational 98 out of 100 Points! Don’t just take our word for it though – try it for yourself!

SEM PORTA

Setúbal, Portugal

CovetED Magazine had the pleasure of experiencing the luxury world and flavours of the “Sem Porta” Restaurant, one of the many restaurants of Sublime Comporta, a luxury retreat in Comporta, Setúbal, Portugal.

Sem Porta is a traditional restaurant and focuses on the Alentejo roots and the recipes passed down from generation to generation. Chef uses regional products, working with local fisherman and wineries, giving precedence to fresh, organic produce whenever possible. From the organic garden, in front of the restaurant, come some of the ingredients that make up the menu. From Portugal and Alentejo, references are recovered and reinvented. Surrounded by pine and cork trees and a luxurious green framing, the Sem Porta Restaurant in Muda is an integral part of Sublime Hotel Comporta. Sem Porta, translated as ‘no door’, reflects its willingness to welcome people into this stunning environment. Chef Hélio Gonçalves is in charge of the kitchen. His creations are inspired by nature, the excellence of local produce and the organic herbs from restaurants own organic garden. Organic and sustainable, whenever is feasible, vegetables, herbs,

rice, meat and fish, are turned into real treats to the palate. The catch of the day comes directly from local fisherman to Sem Porta. In Sem Porta Comporta you can taste wines from every region of Portugal, and also Sublime organizes wine tasting events and has its own brand in association with a local producer. The wines served as a lever, with the hiring of a director for the area, the opening of a store, the organization of workshops and tastings, and the connection to a local producer, in the Brejinho da Costa case, for the specific production of wines. The wine list introducing itself to guests and, increasingly, to visitors, very complete and noted, both in quantity and quality, with some (very) good surprises. The architecture finds its inspiration in the old rice storing facilities of the area. In keeping with the essence of Comporta, the decor is sophisticated yet relaxed. Both the landscape and nature that surround inspire the creations of this restaurant. At Sem Porta, the stars are the local products and producers. There’s a respect for the origins and for time, which in the Alentejo has a different rhythm. Hélio Gonçalves is the current chef of the Sem Porta restaurant, and we had had the pleasure of interviewing him. The Chef joined Sublime Comporta back in 2019, returning from Singapore, where he was Chef Iggy’s executive (a Michelinstarred restaurant) and at Boca with contemporary cuisine, also in Singapore, and Belcanto, from José Avillez Group as a Junior Sub-Chef. Now he leads the main restaurants of Sublime Comporta as Executive Chef: Sem Porta, Food Circle, Tasca da Comporta, and will also lead the latest hotel project: Sublime Comporta Beach Club, opened in May 2020. Just as when we try to sit at the bar when ordering drinks, if there is an opportunity to watch the kitchen team at work, we

will always take it. Sem Porta grants diners this insight thanks to a long window that runs between the kitchen and restaurant. We take a seat in full view of it so that we can witness Chef Hélio and his team do their thing as the night unfurls. As we have a look at the dishes on offer, we’re brought corn and brown bread served with smoky chorizo butter and Cartuxa Winery olive oil. The menu at Sem Porta changes seasonally and promotes local ingredients and the reimagined flavours of Alentejo. All the meals you eat and the menu itself “has a touch” of the experience acquired in Asia. “I always try to respect the origins of the house and the letter”, always honouring Portugal, the head said. With a target audience mostly foreign, the menu is constantly adapting. Hints of fruit, oriental sauces are some of the differences that you can find in the root cuisine practised by the chef in the Alentejo restaurant. In November they will create a new menu, with Alentejo Pork and other Portuguese well-known meat dishes, in order to capture the essence of what can be sought by the Portuguese public, who is already “used to the national meal”. They will include more “earth to earth” dishes that please everyone. Terra a Terra is the new surprise that the hotel is preparing, dogfish soup and other classics already known by visitors to the restaurant. They will also include a tasting menu. In order to keep with its spirit of continuously innovating, Sublime Comporta decided to open its own beach restaurant. Hélio is also the one in charge of the cuisine of this new experience of the group. Sem Porta is one of the best restaurants in Comporta and proof that Comporta is much more than the wonderful beaches. It is also an unmissable experience for gastronomy lovers. If you’re ever around Comporta and looking for a truly heartfelt, highdining experience, make your way to Sublime’s Sem Porta.