He has cooked for two presidents, the Emperor of Japan and the President of the Philippines, but chef Roy Yamaguchi insists that none of those meals were more significant than the one he wants to cook for you.
“To me what is really important are the meals we cook in the restaurant on a day-to-day basis,” he told the Cayman Compass.
“If I don’t have the local support, I don’t have a business and for sure no one is going to be inviting me to cook for heads of state.”
Yamaguchi, the Japanese-American celebrity chef, is in Grand Cayman this week to celebrate 31 years since the opening of his first Roy’s Restaurant and the year-anniversary of the opening of Eating House 1503 in Grand Cayman.
He will host a ticket-only private dinner event at the Margaritaville-based restaurant Thursday night, which will serve as a culinary retrospective on his three decades in the business.
Starting with a Japanese twist on a shrimp cocktail – one of the signature dishes from his early career – Chef Yamaguchi will serve a five-course meal with wine parings that takes diners on a journey through time.
Between courses, he will tell stories of what inspired him to create each dish and how they fit into his life story.
“It is a celebration and a thank-you to my guests,” he said,
Yamaguchi set up his first restaurant in Honolulu, Hawaii, in 1988. He has gone on to found a collection of brands, including Roy’s Restaurants and the Eating House.
He cooked for President Barack Obama when he visited Hawaii during his re-election campaign in 2011.
Eating House 1503 is a relatively rare venture outside the US for the chef.
He said he chose Cayman as a natural expansion for his brand, which is based largely in the US and Guam, as well as on a couple of major cruise lines.
“I am delighted with how it has gone so far and to be accepted into the community. It is great for me to be here to meet our guests who have been supporting the restaurant.”
Yamaguchi said he was pleased to join a growing culinary tradition in Cayman, with chefs like Dean Max at the Brasserie and Eric Ripert, who set the ball rolling for the island’s fine dining reputation with his restaurant Blue at The Ritz-Carlton.
| The event takes place from 6:30pm on Thursday at Eating House 1503 at the Margaritaville resort. Tickets cost $85 and are available from [email protected].
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