Endo Kazutoshi opens a 10-seat omakase counter in Chelsea
The sushi chef behind Endo at the Rotunda opens a second London address on 1 October, with a hinoki counter shipped from Kyoto and a listening bar upstairs.
Endo Kazutoshi opens Endo in Chelsea on 1 October, a 10-seat omakase counter with no fixed menu, in the former home of the Michelin-starred Five Fields on Blacklands Terrace.
Guests sit at a single hinoki wood counter shipped from Kyoto, more than 200 years old, and eat whatever Endo decides to prepare that night. The room is designed like a Japanese ryokan, with references to the omakase counters of 1920s and 1930s Tokyo.
Fish from British waters, seasoning from Japan
No menu, ten seats, one two-century-old counter: Endo's second act bets on restraint, not expansion.
Every course draws on wild-caught fish from the British Isles, a shift from the imported-heavy sourcing typical of high-end sushi counters in London. Seasonings come from further afield: nori from Hayashiya at Tokyo's Toyosu Market, and soy sauce from Kajita Shoten, a producer in Ehime prefecture that has traded since 1874.
Endo, who was born in Yokohama, moved to London in 2006 after Zuma founder Rainer Becker recruited him. He opened his first solo restaurant, Endo at the Rotunda in White City, in April 2019 and won a Michelin star the following year. Chelsea is his second address in the city.
A listening bar upstairs, for now diners only
Above the restaurant sits Moga, a bar built around custom Taguchi speakers and a playlist curated with Ken Sakamoto, a manager at Comme des Garçons. The food menu there strays furthest from sushi, built on Endo's own travels through Paris, Milan, Madrid, Hong Kong and Tokyo, and includes a red mullet sandwich and a Cocido Madrileño. The drinks list is built with London's Postcard Teas.
Moga opens only to Endo's own diners at first, before taking walk-in guests from December. The two-room format gives Endo a second stage in a city already dense with omakase counters, betting that a hyper-local fish list and a Kyoto counter can set Chelsea apart from White City. A recent review of Bullpen in Tokyo shows the bar for sushi keeps rising on both ends of the map.
