Director of Culinary Operations and F&B at The Landmark Mandarin Oriental, Hong Kong, chef consultant at Fifty 8° Grill Richard Ekkebus, the two Michelin-starred chef and culinary director of Amber at The Landmark Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Hong Kong, served up a special tasting menu at Fifty 8° Grill on November 27 and 28.

Phillip Taylor, the new chef de cuisine at Fifty 8° Grill, joined Ekkebus and his team in creating this unique dining experience. Wines for each dish were also prepared by John Chan and Tansy Zhao, sommeliers at Amber and Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai respectively.

The menu featured many of the finest creations by Ekkebus and his Amber team, including iconic dishes like sea urchin served in lobster Jell-O with cauliflower.

Those who sampled this sea urchin dish in Shanghai were all the more fortunate since this refined creation has been off the menu at Amber since May.

"The sea urchin is a famous dish. It also became a burden for us because every season we invest a lot of time and energy in creating a new menu. Yet 99 percent of the guests would always order the sea urchin," Ekkebus explained.

Luckily, this much-loved dish will soon find new life. Ekkebus donated the recipe to Corey Lee, who will debut it next year at his new restaurant, In Situ, located in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (MOMA).

Also on Ekkebus' menu in Shanghai was black cod confit with bouillon and puree celeriac, as well as Savoy cabbage leaves and razor clams with yuzu.

"We use a lot of Japanese ingredients, but we don't use Japanese flavors. We always use the western taste," he explained.

For example, Ekkebus explained that he uses seaweeds to bring out taste and flavor without adding salt.

Ekkebus also uses many Chinese ingredients in his kitchen for this occasion.

"The sea urchin is Dalian sea urchin, not Japanese," he explained. "I think it would be foolish for us to think that everything from abroad is by definition better." The real issue, as Ekkebus sees it, isn't the quality of local produce — it's availability. Two years ago, for instance, it was impossible to get fresh mushrooms from Yunnan to Shanghai, the chef said.

"The problem is not the products. The problem is the infrastructure. There's some fantastic products in China, they just don’t come very easily, or consistently, to Shanghai," he said.

Over the years, Ekkebus has built Amber into one of Hong Kong's finest restaurants.

In addition to earning for 8 consecutive years two stars from the Michelin Guide for Hong Kong and Macau, Amber has also been on the "World's 50 Best Restaurants" list for five years in a row.

Commenting on the difference between the restaurant markets in Hong Kong and Shanghai, the chef noted: "Hong Kong is more mature... but Shanghai is more fun. The food scene is very playful." Nevertheless, Ekkebus also observed that while some Chinese chefs are trying to break new culinary ground, many are still firmly rooted in local food traditions.

He sees this in the current preoccupation many Chinese chefs have in reviving old recipes and lost food knowledge.

"What you don't want to see is someone doing French food with Chinese influence," he commented.

"I think what people are looking for today is story. I think that just doing simple, nice food is not enough anymore. There's a need to have a regional story, you need to have something that is representative," Ekkebus said.

Fifty 8° Grill is a French restaurant at Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai that focuses on traditional French cuisine. Richard Ekkebus is the restaurant’s chef consultant.

Address: 111 Pudong Rd South (Fifty 8° Grill)

Tel: 2082-9938