RESTAURANT Takao Takano — Restaurant in Lyon

A beautiful experience where fine dining is at its best. The minimalistic decor is set off nicely with the warm lighting. The staff welcome you with bright smiles & make you feel at ease - with easy banter and a friendly manner. The menu is well explained and we were informed of the day’s special dish of veal kidneys (which we did try as a additional dish to the basic degustation menu for an additional Euro 20 per person). The Japanese chef excels in how he has combined the fineries of French cuisine with the pureness of Japanese cooking. Every dish was a sight to behold & combinations were quite complicated yet one could taste individually the various components. Definitely the chef knows his craft well & has placed alot of thought in how to serve them. It is difficult to point out a particularly special dish as each one was superb. We were being adventurous in adding the kidneys but for the faint hearted, it may not be recommended. Although tender with nice texture, the offal taste was a little overpowering & the centre fatty portion of kidney was served intact (we are used to eating kidneys of smaller animals where only the outer portion is finely sliced & fried). The portion was large & it was a bit of a struggle to finish this dish - but we did our best! Overall - we had a very nice experience & highly recommend this restaurant when in Lyon. A nice gesture, as we were unable to finish our petit fours & madelines at the end, they made a little take away bag for this. The price point for a 2 Michelin starred restaurant is reasonable & reservations are essential as it seats at max...

Don't risk a special night on this place. Absolute WORST fine dinning experience I've had thus far.

I RARELY leave bad reviews unless I really feel it is necessary. We left 10 minutes into being seated.

It was a special birthday dinner so we called ahead to ask about food preferences and see if they could accommodate certain dietary preferences..... they agreed it wouldn't be an issue.

When we arrived they told us this is the menu and no changes can be made and we all needed to order the same thing. Very different story than what the "chef" told us on the phone.

So of course we had to leave since my mother on her birthday wasn't able to order something from a menu that wasn't even presented to us until arrival...

We were told in front of the whole restaurant that we were lucky they don't charge us 150 euros per head and that the chef doesn't want people in his restaurant that don't appreciate his food which was not the case.

So instead of the chef aka the owner coming out and asking how he could help his clients. We were scolded in front of other guests.

Here is the best part... once we left the restaurant the chef ran after us on the street to tell us we disrespected him and physically got in our...

I have been here twice...not just for the sake of consistency. The food, plating, wine list, sommelier, service, ambiance, and whiskey list are all worthy of it's Michelin star. The sommelier remembered everything from my first visit (March 2017!). They even got me to like cheese...and if anyone that knows me is reading this, you know that is no small task.

The staff is proficient in both English and French. For you red blooded Yankees that come here...you'll never find value like this in the states. My only nag about this place is that it can start off as too quiet...like afraid to put your glass down too hard quiet. By the end of the meal it is much better...maybe because everyone is generally feeling good and are a bit louder. And if the chef imagined someone eating the dish in certain way, I would ask that the staff let its patrons know too. Small things in the grand scheme.

I have been to 30+ places in Lyon...some on par, some not...and this is the best. Now, that may or may not change before I leave...I'll update this...