Chef Diego Oka is one of those creative souls who isn’t held back by the confines of the kitchen so it wasn’t surprising to learn that during the pandemic he honed his skills at the pottery wheel and started creating a line of ceramics for the Peruvian cuisine he serves at La Mar by Gastón Acurio at Mandarin Oriental. A collection of 400 handcrafted pieces resulted, and he created an eight-course tasting menu to accompany the dishware, launching earlier this year under the name AMANO by Oka, offered as an experience within the restaurant three nights a week, from Thursdays through Saturdays with two seatings a night. And now that the Mandarin Oriental is officially closing, you have only three weeks left to experience it.
To make the pieces, Oka converted a hotel room at the Mandarin into his ceramics studio, taking out beds and installing shelves and work desks onto the plush premises. The result is a highly personal, extremely delicious experience that allows Oka to play with the conventions of Nikkei cuisine while also delving deeper into Peruvian cooking techniques and its influences, incorporating Japanese, Spanish, and Andean elements.
And indeed the dishes tell a story from the very start with a first course “La Flor” which presents a pink beet causa festooned with a crown of edible flowers, osetra caviar and 24K gold flakes, evoking “ikebana,” the Japanese art of flower arranging nestled on top of a thick slab-like plate representing the architectural style of “Brutalism” prevalent throughout Peru. The second course, a tiradito, is served in a round-shaped bowl that is inspired by a murano glass dish that Oka previously designed for the 2018 Milan Design Fair, with carved edges perfect for spooning up the nationally treasured dish.
There are also keepsakes and mementos that offer moments of wonder and whimsy like the printed postcards of each piece with abstract illustrations and high-quality photography depicting the dishes. And a playful moment comes towards the end of the meal when a server presents each guest with an iconic red viewfinder toy, here showing a slideshow of Oka at work in his studio. The most meaningful gift, though, is when a guest is offered to choose their hand-crafted spoons for the dessert course then presented with a keepsake box to take the spoon home. That dessert – a dish of white asparagus ice cream paired with caramelized red onions and a reduction of Modena balsamic vinegar, topped with crunchy quinoa and a drizzle of olive oil, then finished with Maras salt from Cusco – is as memorable as the spoons used to eat it, a fitting coda to the imaginative feast.
For now, the eight-course experience is being offered three nights a week, from Thursdays through Saturdays with two seatings a night (the experience lasts about two and half hours) with an optional wine pairing. With AMANO Oka is turning clay the way he creates dishes – with creativity and soul.