This culinary team from New York teamed up with Pharrell to open two Miami restaurants (original) (raw)

The 10-seat chef’s counter at Matsuyoi Japanese restaurant in Miami.

A culinary team from New York has opened two new Japanese restaurants in Miami’s Design District.

Temaki — an open style of Japanese handroll — is the specialty of Nami Nori, which opened its first restaurant in the West Village in 2019. The Nami Nori team, which includes managing partner Lisa Limb and chef-partners Taka Sakaeda and Jihan Lee, has partnered for the first time with Grammy Award-winning musician Pharrell Williams to bring the concepts to Miami.

The restaurants are just around the corner from the restaurant Elastika, which opened in the historic landmark Moore Building earlier this year. Downstairs is Nami Nori, with a bright dining room decorated in shades of cream and brown that specializes in the famous temaki.

Specialty rolls include X.O. scallop with tobiko (roe) and lemon; tuna poke with shallots; spicy crab dynamite and cucumber black sesame with shiso and plum. The menu also offers a variety of snacks and starters such as Asari clam soup with miso and butter, and wasabi cucumber tataki.

Nami Nori Design District, which specializes in temaki, is one of two new Japanese restaurants in the neighborhood.

One of the more popular menu items involves dessert: Mochurros, mochi churros that come with a lemon curd dipping sauce.

Nami Nori also has a cocktail program, with drinks created with Molly McClintock, former beverage director of Hana Makgeolli, an artisanal Korean rice wine maker in Brooklyn. Signature drinks include Mother of Pearl with gin, vermouth and sake and garnished with Okinawan sea grapes; Wake Up Call, with vodka, coffee liqueur, coconut, umeshu (a Japanese liqueur) and vanilla; and the Matcharita, with tequila, matcha, agave, green apple, mint and cucumber.

Chef-partner Taka Sakaeda, managing partner Lisa Limb and chef-partner Jihan Lee from Nami Nori in the Design District.

Above Nami Nori is the more glamorous Matsuyoi, a 10-seat-chef’s counter you find by climbing the stairs and slipping through sliding doors just past a small cocktail bar. Matsuyoi also features temaki with toasted nori (seaweed) and has its own cocktail program that features drinks like Indigo Blue with Ten to One dark rum infused with black rice, sake and rice syrup.

The design is dark to Nami Nori’s light. Both restaurants were designed by Lisa Limb working with the New York-based architecture firm MN Design Professional Corporation.

Just remember: While Nami Nori welcomes walk-in customers, you’ll need a reservation for Matsuyoi.

Temaki — open-style hand rolls — at Nami Nori restaurant in Miami’s Design District.

Nami Nori and Matsuyoi

Where: 156 NE 41st St., Miami

Reservations: OpenTable

More information: www.naminori.us or 786-598-8848

Miami Herald

Connie Ogle loves wine, books and the Miami Heat. Please don’t make her eat a mango.