We asked seven of our best chefs to name their favorite meal in the world—and their answers had us longing for a taste!
To those who live to eat, food memories are incredibly powerful. We remember every bite, every aroma, and how that particular dish or meal made us feel.
We wondered if chefs of a certain caliber also have dishes they dream about or long for, knowing that perhaps they themselves can prepare an equally memorable meal if they wanted to. We asked them one question: What is the best meal you have eaten in the world?
Some were able to answer immediately, while some had to dig deep or choose from a good number of exceptional food they have consumed throughout their lives.
Jorge Mendez (Modan/Ohayo/Tadeo)
The Sword Fish Belly with Seaweed and Brown Butter Sauce of Noma Kyoto. I love simple dishes with rare ingredients, popping flavors, and rare flavor combinations so for me, this one is the best. Another one, though, would be the Buffalo Milk Caramelle Pasta at Don Angie’s which, to me, is one of the best restaurants in New York.
These are candied-shaped pasta filled with buffalo milk ricotta, browned butter sauce, and candied kumquats. I absolutely love this dish! It’s an explosion of flavors— sweet, savory, with slightly toasted notes. When you take a bite of the pasta, the cheese envelops all the flavors and balances everything out.
Tina Legarda (Bamba Bistro)
It was a meal I had in Nice, France. We explored the French Riviera all day and ended up in this very unassuming place for dinner. You are welcomed in by this beautiful French lady (probably in her 60s) who exudes so much warmth. There was no menu but instead, she would carry a handwritten board and give her recommendations with so much depth.
We started off with a few delicious appetizers, the wine she insisted we get went so perfectly with the whole meal. But, it was my main course that literally made me cry. It was a Lobster Risotto and the best one I have had in my life. The lobster tasted like it was caught seconds before they poached it; the risotto was sublime— buttery in all the right places and did its job of celebrating that lobster sitting on top of it. And the sauce — made of all the juice from the lobster head — was nothing short of incredible. The dish was masterfully restrained, humbling, and beautiful.
Aaron Isip (Kasa Palma)
Top of my list is Asador Extebarri which I dined at back in 2007. The restaurant is super rustic and the food looked so simple but the flavors were spot on — an unbelievable concentration of smoky flavors with exceptional local produce. Theirs is the best Lamb Dish I’ve ever had.
The second is at La Grenouillère— it’s like entering the world of Chef Alexandre Gauthier. The whole experience was amazing— you start your Hors D’œuvres at the lounge bar which is filled with many frog trinkets. It’s like a French country house in a marshland where frogs abound. Then you enter the dining room which offers views of the surrounding forest and nearby river. The restaurant’s one-of-a-kind open kitchen is a sight to behold — it has a contemporary design like no other. The food is unique, fantastic, inventive, and most of all, delicious! Of course, they had a frog legs dish that was probably the best I’ve ever had! They also have an inn where you can stay the night in a traditional gîte or French cottage.
Yuichi Ito (Crosta Pizzeria and Bianca Omakase Niseko—and soon in Manila)
The best meal I’ve eaten has always been the Unagi Shirayaki from this very old unagi (freshwater eel) restaurant called Umatetsut, in my hometown of Asakusa, Japan. Often times when we say “unagi” as a dish, the first thing that comes to mind is the unagi kabayaki which has a very fluffy and char-flavored unagi topped over rice. The beautiful thing about shirayaki, especially when it’s grilled Nagoya-style, is that the fish is grilled straight over binchotan — meat-side first then finished on the skin side to give that very crispy skin and juicy meat which we often eat with freshly grated wasabi and sea moss salt.
I remember my mom told me that the quality of the unagi is very important for this kind of cooking technique because of how bare and simple it was. And, as far as my memory goes, my experience of eating the unagi shirayaki in Unatetsut was the first time the thing called “quality product” got stuck in my brain.
Charles Montanez (Liyab/Anomaly)
Best and favorite meal was my dinner at Zen restaurant in Singapore. I think it wasn’t just the food itself but everything I have associated with that memory. Apart from being a 3-star dining experience, it was also the first time I sat down alone for 4 hours straight just for a meal. The experience was able to hit all the senses— from top-notch service and well-thought execution of hospitality, to the seamless presentation and explanation of each course along with table-side finishing of plates. It inspired me on the level I want to achieve in a restaurant. There was no course that I did not like during that meal. Everything was a hit, and it was probably the most food I ate in one sitting. Everything was clean on the palate and done great from top to bottom.
Francis Lim (Tipple and Slaw/Tipple Cafe/Chairman Fu)
Beef Cheeks from San Sebastian, Spain, especially the ones of Borda Berri and La Cuchara. It’s something I feel would be wonderful to eat before going to heaven. It’s so tender, beefy, simple yet complex. Great wine was used, and I heard it’s because San Sebastian is quite near Bourdeaux, the wine capital of the world. The beef cheeks are served to you on a small plate—nothing fancy but how it looks is more appealing than a really expensive steak.
Patrick Go (Your Local/Gochugang)
As a fan of simple and straightforward cooking, I truly enjoyed my meal at Yakitori Ichiimatsu in Osaka, Japan. It is a one-star Michelin restaurant that offers thirteen to fifteen courses of yakitori dishes. I consider this as the best meal I’ve ever had because of its simplicity and quality. Every dish was super flavorful, with less than three ingredients per dish. They also highlighted their variety of local Hinai Chicken which had a very clean flavor that contrasted the rich and smokey binchotan grill. Service was impeccable, too! The chefs were fun to talk to and they were very proud of their menu.
