Tom Aikens' Newest EDITION

December 06, 2022

In celebration of the recently opened Jade Room and Garden Terrace at The Tokyo EDITION, Toranomon. office caught up with the award-winning, Michelin-starred chef Tom Aikens to taste a few of his magical creations and better understand the man behind numerous world-renowned restaurants. As his first restaurant in Japan, we were excited to chat with the ever-cheerful Tom, who told us what it means to finally have his footprint in Tokyo and about some of his fondest food experiences to date.

Set on the 31st floor adjacent to the lobby, The Jade Room and Garden Terrace is the hotel’s signature restaurant, offering fresh and innovative food to be appreciated by locals and travelers alike. Honoring the versatility and expressiveness ingrained in Japanese culture and cuisine, Tom Aikens’ menu pushes these boundaries further to deliver a fusion of contemporary Japanese and Western influenced dishes prepared using diverse yet refined cooking techniques — all enjoyed against an astonishing backdrop of the Tokyo Tower and city skyline.

Photography and Interview Mitchell Connell

What’s your favourite ingredient?

Flour is one of the most important ingredients as it is so versatility in everything we cook in the kitchen, but we are more and more conscious of guests own allergies and dietaries, that we always have to have something else in our back pocket.

I have always loved bread: it has been part of my world as far back as I can remember, from soft squidgy bread to hard crusty rolls and to sourdough. I have been very fortunate to have made bread under the guidance of some excellent teachers such as Pierre Koffmann, Richard Hart, Emmanuel Hadjiandreou and Michael James, all amazing bakers.

The one thing that I have always loved making the most with flour is bread, particularly sourdough. There is something truly comforting, rhythmic, almost hypnotic about making sourdough. You never become a complete master at it , as you are always learning no matter what.

An amazing thick skinned Amalfi lemon is not only beautiful to look at but full of flavour. Whether using the ski or juice into a sauce, vinaigrette or onto a piece of cooked fish can make a huge difference using the very best lemon. , or adding a little micro-planed lemon zest can also add a little extra citrus taste. Use the very best lemons you can find as it will give better flavour all round.

Scallops hand dived also are one of the tastiest shellfish species, they are sweet, juicy and they can handle a multiple number of flavours, from acidic, sweet, salty and savoury. They taste great grilled, poached, barbecued, or blow torched and even raw. I like them cooked simply just over hot coals, cooked in the ½ shell, with little olive oil, Maldon salt, butter, lemon zest, picked thyme, razor blade sliced garlic. Place a tsp of butter in the bottom of the shell, place the scallop on top, drizzle in a good olive oil, mircro-plane the lemon over, picked thyme leaves and garlic. Place onto the fire, making sure the butter goes nut brown only, then baste the scallop for 3-4 minutes. Finish with a squeeze of lemon juice.

What’s the first thing you steal from the EDITION mini bar?

There is a super tasty snack that I tried recently from the Edition Tokyo minibar, which was these freeze-dried truffle chips, which were unusual but rather Moorish. I don’t have a sweet tooth; however these were rather good I have to say!

How would you describe the perfect dish?

Great food is key to making a lasting impression on someone. The perfect dish does not have

to be super gastronomic; it can be simply done and perfectly executed with great service and an enjoyable atmosphere. Mystery and intrigue are what lead the dining experience, so a culinary journey should be at the forefront of any menu. Each dish should be well thought-out with a clear reason as to why it appears on the menu. This leaves a lasting impression, creating a nostalgic, feel-good experience for each person to reflect on in their own way – food is so personal, after all.

Which dish or ingredient is criminally overrated?

This ingredient isn’t necessarily overrated, however the one ingredient I see too often in most cities when it’s completely out of season is asparagus, and I don’t know why as there are so many amazing seasonal products that could be used as an alternative. The British love asparagus, but sadly it’s been allowed to grow all year round in some far-flung warmer climates.

What’s been your experience eating and working in Tokyo?

I am impressed how Japanese people carefully handle ingredients and the respect they pay to them. The same is true of the staff, who work very hard and memorize each recipe precisely. I have worked all over the world, and I have found that the Japanese have a very high level of awareness and skill. I just want to thank the staff. The unique Japanese culture is wonderful and fascinating, but I am especially impressed by the passion of the Japanese people.

There are a broad range of Japanese ingredients that can be used for all sorts of seasonings from Dashi broths, ferments, pickles, dried fish & shrimp, soy, a whole range of vinegars, dried kombu & kelp. Using very seasonal ingredients that are of the highest quality & even between the seasons, you have produce that comes into season for just a matter of weeks only. I think Japan is one of the top 3 countries to work in" for chefs around the world. It is so attractive because of the abundance of seasonal ingredients. Compared to the UK, Japan has far more varieties of fish and vegetables. Meat is classified into smaller categories.

There are a vast number of amazing restaurants that are always very consistent in cooking and creativity. Tokyo has the largest number of Michelin restaurants than any other city, so you can understand why!

What is the biggest mistake a chef can make in a kitchen?

Not listening or paying attention. You must be 100% focussed in everything you do to make sure that you are consistent in your cooking.

Being from the UK, cooking in Tokyo and other parts of the world. How do you gain an understanding of local cuisines?

Each time I build up a concept and curate new menus for a part of the world I am new to cooking in, I lead a thorough study of the market I am creating the concept/menu for beforehand to understand what the local market trends are, what is missing from that dining scene, what the locals needs and wants and what I could bring to the table. It is of course incredibly important to visit the city in question to get the answers to all these questions, therefore a full research and development trip is carried out which is the fun part. I will visit local markets to research what local produce is available, dine at local restaurants in the area to carry out a competitor analysis to experience first-hand what other restaurants are doing and doing well or not so well at. I talk to chefs who have been working in the city, finding out which suppliers they use and what they recommend in terms of ingredients. The quality of the produce and the food cost plays an essential part in the creation of a new menu, as I try to source my ingredients locally wherever possible.

Is there anything you refuse to eat?

When I was in Japan for the first time, I was given some soft poached milt (whale sperm) which I would not want to repeat! I also have a dislike to smoked salmon.

If you weren’t a chef, what would you be?

I consider myself as a bit of a thrill seeker, so I would probably be a professional jockey. My cousin was a profession jockey, winning the Cheltenham Gold cup 3 times in a row and so I used to spend a lot of time with him on occasions. For fun, he did some mild training with me and then let me loose on the tracks with one of his racehorses, which as you can imagine was insanely fast! I am surprised I managed to stay on the horse considering the speed, but it was a huge thrill, my adrenalin was sky high for some time after that.

What is your best food memory?

When I was 12 years olds, on a particular trip down to France, my father booked us into a Michelin Star restaurant/hotel, by complete accident. My father never used a guidebook as everything back then was recommended by word of mouth, or a notable place to go and try out. He only realised the magnitude of what he had booked when we arrived at the hotel to find our car surrounded by four guys wearing white gloves in white jackets and bow ties. That evening I had the most amazing meal that I have never to this day forgot. It is one of those inspirational gastronomic moments that I will always remember, ask any chef and I think they will have a story that is similar. 1984 so It was still the era of nouvelle cuisine, tiny little portions delicately put together with the tiniest of details.

The tastes and flavours were stunning. I had the most beautiful simple tomato salad with a stunning fragrant olive oil, basil, finely diced shallots, course sea salt, black pepper and chives, all these flavours I remember as if it was yesterday. For main course I had the most tender fillet steak that melted in my mouth – a tall tower of beef fillet that had been larded with beef fat, it was sublime and perfection in one, we also had the best chips ever, an accompanying stacked tower of perfectly cooked and cut potato, that had been cooked in proper beef dripping, crisp, golden glistening chips that where perfection.

The waiters lifting endless cloche after cloche for my parents with course after course of frogs legs and snails, which I of course thought was really weird eating garden animals. Then the pudding arrived, simple poached peach, raspberry coulis and a big ball of vanilla ice-cream that was just out of this world, my god I was now in seventh heaven, this was the first time that I had eaten real vanilla ice cream, can you imagine the taste explosion, I was in heaven and as I say I’ll never forget it.

Best advice you’ve ever gotten?

Follow orders thoroughly, work hard, have self-belief, be patient and persevere - sometimes working as a chef involves taking steps backwards and forwards to get to where you want to be.

Do you have a favourite fast food?

A great chicken burger!

What’s a must do in Tokyo?

There is so much to see and do here. Tokyo is an amazing city of both old and new as ancient shrines are surrounded by modern buildings. There are shrines, museums, marketplaces, a huge number of restaurants, literally no end of places to go and things to see, you could spend years exploring Japan.

Best hangover feed?

A good old fry up has plenty of ingredients packed with energy, carbs, and protein but sometimes I’ll opt for a warm hearty porridge for the ultimate start to the day.

What’s something you look forward to every single day?

A fresh new day always has something new to achieve and be better at. The simplest thing that can make a difference in your positivity for the day, knowing that I cannot really ever be in a bad mood, as it effects the outcome of a lot of things and it stops positive things from happening. My mantra is stay happy to fuel better energy for everyone around you.

What’s next for Tom?

My priority is to make sure that all my restaurants around the world are run smoothly and remain at the same standards of quality and service they strive to achieve. 2023 is shaping up to be an incredibly busy year with some very exciting new projects in the pipeline, so watch this space! There may even be some double trouble twin cooking happening!

Culture

The Club Is Coming to the Stage

We enter and make our way to what is approximately front left of the DJ booth, where we’re accustomed to dancing at clubs in New York. “So is this a techno club or a dance performance?” yells an uncertain participant in my boyfriend’s ear. He laughs, bouncing along to Ben UFO, and yells back, “It’s both!” The club has long been a hot topic in European contemporary dance but it is only now making its way into New York performance venues, largely through transatlantic tours. R.O.S.E. follows recent examples like Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1 (May 2024), (LA)HORDE’s Room with a View at NYU Skirball (October 2023), and Gisèle Vienne’s Crowd at BAM (October 2022).

Do these performances compromise the club’s spirit — a space idealized for its anonymity, dark lighting, and thundering music? The notion of the club as a utopian escape is admittedly just that — an ideal — because of how its intense conditions can create barriers to entry. Still, the club remains sacred for many, a place to forge connections and embrace an alternative state of being. Looking at how performances transfer this spirit to new settings reveals what aspects of the club are essential and those that aren’t.

Sharon Eyal, R.O.S.E. 2024. Photography by Stephanie Berger, courtesy of Park Avenue Armory.

Eyal’s dancers make their entrance. The lighting shifts from roving blue to yellow spotlights as Ben UFO’s tracks transition to more melodic beats. Clad in deconstructed lace Dior lingerie with dark red tears painted on their faces, the dancers move cautiously in a tightly maintained pack, slicing paths through the horde with hoof-like steps and jerky leg extensions. After around ten minutes of this controlled choreography, the dancers vanish as the lighting shifts back to blue and Ben UFO picks up his dubby beats. The club, as we knew it, resumes. This cycle of tightly executed movements and free-flowing club-goers repeats several times, each time emboldening the dancers to plunge further into the crowd.

Clubbing in a building once built for the U.S. Army National Guard on Manhattan’s Upper East Side turns out to be surprisingly successful — at least for the audience. What starts as an awkward, scattered group searching for their non existent seats gradually gels into an engaged, bouncing crowd that erupts in cheers each time the dancers enter and exit. Performance patrons who might never step foot in a club find themselves swept up in its potential for communion, moving in unison with fellow ticket holders. But it isn’t until the very end of R.O.S.E. that the dancers finally break free from Eyal’s choreography and join the fired-up audience in a brief moment of improvisatory movement with the music. By keeping her dancers at arm’s length, Eyal seems more interested in the club as a backdrop for her signature movement style than wholly as a space with meaningful stories to be told.

Michele Rizzo, HIGHER xtn. 2024. Photography by Cameron Kelly courtesy of MoMA PS1.

Back in May, I attended Wire Festival, a multiday electronic music event at Knockdown Center that had no shortage of organically united dancefloors. It attracted a crowd of seasoned ravers who were eager to celebrate the start of spring as they danced alongside DJs who played well into the daylight. I left Wire in an afternoon daze to see Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1. My sleepless euphoria only deepened as the performance unfolded, starting with a lone dancer who looked plucked out of the festival.

The dancer, dressed in sneakers, baggy jeans, and a tight tank top, shuffled slowly into the gallery, perfectly in sync with the looping bars of an understated electronic melody. Soon, other dancers, clad in the same staple rave uniform, joined him — each having traveled from Europe for the U.S. museum debut of HIGHER xtn., which premiered at the Stedelijk in Amsterdam in 2018 and quickly became a fixture at kunsthalles and festivals across the continent. As the score’s tempo climbed, the choreography locked into a 16-count sequence, which the dancers executed with precise synchrony. They remained intensely focused, never making eye contact with each other, as they sought release in the endless repetition of synthesized beats. Once the dancers reached their limit, they stopped the sequence and exited the gallery, one by one.

HIGHER xtn. used the focused daylight of the gallery to highlight the meditative release found in the repetitive movements that dominate dark dancefloors. The performance’s restraint brought more consistency and intentionality than Eyal’s all-encompassing club construction in R.O.S.E. Yet both performances offer enticing entry points into club culture for those who may not frequent raves. Rizzo’s ecstatic, hypnotic repetitions reveal how the club can mirror other meditative practices, while Eyal’s interpolation of performance and clubbing helped hesitant audience members blossom by the end. Still, both works overlook one of the most underappreciated aspects of clubbing — its potential for individual expression. HIGHER xtn.’s pristine uniformity especially risks promoting the outdated techno trope that there’s a “right” way to dance to electronic music.

Maybe this shortcoming is, in fact, a benefit. For habitual ravers jaded by one too many sunrise sets, it’s a reminder to return to the club with more intention. If you pause and peer through the darkness, you’ll see hundreds of people moving to the same beat, each with their own subtle variations. This collective choreography is a ready-made spectacle that doesn’t need validation in a theater or museum. And when the music shifts slightly, you can watch the ripple effect sweep through the crowd while feeling the new beat in your body. Maybe this small bit of magic is best left on the dance floor.

Culture

Real Slick, Jack: Psyche Organic Arrives in New York

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Culture

Porsche SCOPES Brings Art, Music, and Design to Toronto

The festival was a full immersion into Toronto’s dynamic creative energy. Day one set the tone with DJ collective Living Room, followed by an experimental performance by Claire Rousay that captivated the crowd. Jewelry designer Steff Eleoff unveiled her Porsche Taycan 4S art car installation—a bold fusion of automotive and wearable art inspired by her Sedona ring—while OVO Sound’s Naomi Sharon and DVSN wrapped up the night with powerful, genre-defying performances.

We witnessed SCOPES Toronto bridging underground and mainstream with day two’s lineup. DJ Korea Town Acid’s set paved the way for Angelphroot and Dameer’s debut of BASSMATI, a track blending South Asian influences with bass-driven sounds. Chippy Nonstop’s return to Toronto and Richie Hawtin’s extended set were milestones of the evening, proving that the city’s underground scene has a global resonance.

The final day featured standout performances from local pianist Harrison, Indigenous artist Tia Wood, and hip-hop visionary Sean Leon, who elevated his set with a live choir. Moonshine Collective’s film and musical performance explored themes of African utopia, showcasing art’s power to bridge culture and technology. Rising Toronto star SadBoi, who paused her tour to perform at SCOPES, further underscored the festival’s commitment to nurturing local talent.

Throughout the weekend, we experienced installations from artists like Mitsu Mitsu and culinary creations from Bar Mordecai, capturing the multifaceted creativity Porsche SCOPES brought to Toronto. This milestone 10th edition, open to all, allowed Toronto’s vibrant arts scene to thrive, underscoring SCOPES’ mission to celebrate local talent while connecting it to a global audience.

office had the chance to connect with rising star SadBoi ahead of the event. In our conversation, she shared insights into her creative journey and reflected on what performing and growing up in Toronto means to her and her work.

How are you, and where are you at right now? You told me you were traveling.

Um, I’m good, I’m feeling really good right now. I’m traveling back to Salt Lake City. I had a show yesterday in Seattle. I’m on tour right now with Coco and Claire.

How is touring life treating you? Do you like it?

I love being on the road. To be honest, I feel like I don’t know—like I’ve had good experiences and bad ones—but this time it’s really fun, especially with the people I’m surrounded by. It’s also the longest tour I’ve been on; I have about four more weeks to go. I’m trying not to think about how many days I have left.

Do you feel homesick?

Yes, because when I start thinking about how many days are left, I start to miss my dogs. I’ve just been trying to stay in the moment—I don’t even know what day of the week it is, to be honest with you.

Oh, sweet! What are your dogs’ names?

Jillian and Winston. I know, they’re crazy names.

You’ll be performing at SCOPES in Toronto, which is where you grew up. Do you feel like the crowd is different when you perform in Toronto compared to other cities?

Yes, I mean, Toronto just feels different because it’s home. Every time I come back to perform, something in my career has changed. The last time I performed in Toronto, people just wanted to have a good time, and I’m excited to perform back home again to see everyone’s reactions. I know it’s going to be different from the last time. It’s exciting to see your own growth. Toronto is a tough crowd, though. If we’re with you, we’re really with you.

So, they’re super picky? You have to gain their respect, or what is it?

I think Toronto people are in their own world, but when something really connects with them, they’ll lose themselves in the moment. But it takes something to bring them out of that. Toronto crowds are tough because even if they like you, they won’t show it outright until they’re really vibing with you.

It’s like a vibe check, right?

Exactly. They’ll enjoy your performance, but it’s hard to explain. When people visit Toronto, they often say, “Oh, you guys are so nice,” and I’m like, “I don’t think we’re that nice, we’re just polite.” Like, you can walk down the street, and no one will say anything, but it’s just our mannerisms.

You mentioned Toronto can have a moody energy, especially at night, and that the underground night scene there really inspires you. Can you talk more about what makes Toronto's nightlife so influential for you?

Absolutely, Toronto has this unique energy that comes alive at night. Similar to New York, there are the popular clubs everyone knows, but you need to find your niche—the people who know where the real parties are. I remember going to raves in high school yards, sneaking in because I wasn’t old enough. Events like Baby, Jerk!, and Yes Yes Y’all were pivotal, exposing me to DJs blending dancehall with EDM—something I hadn’t seen before. Toronto nightlife is moody and intense, but when everyone’s out, it’s like the whole city is alive.