Matsuhisa Munich — Restaurant in Munich

After the very positive experience, I was very excited to go for brunch again with a friend, and having sung praises of the food at the hanami party.

Perhaps it was the atmosphere that night, but I found the experience today left me underwhelmed. It was slightly confusing in terms of what it was trying to achieve: was it like a degustation? Omakase? Buffet brunch? There were definitely inconsistencies with the quality, portion size and service.

First, I applaud this approach because it is very labour intensive to be serving up one dish after the other to each table, and to keep track of what has been served/or not. This also minimizes food wastage, which I am all for. However, it also becomes a double edged sword: it's great service to be served a la table, but you get inconsistent service depending on the service staff. Some are more experienced and will tell you a bit more about the dishes. It was also inevitable that certain dishes from the list would have been missed out (it was their suggestion that they would serve us everything and then we could see if we wanted to repeat any item). We didn't know if we should ask them if the item was still in preparation or they had simply forgotten about us.

Also, part of the joy and experience of going to a brunch/buffet would be to walk around and see the offerings and make the decision on what and how much to eat. I felt that in this case, we did not have the option to do so, as the tempo was determined by the kitchen and service staff, and there were instances where they was a long breaks in between and then suddenly 3-4 dishes in quickfire succession.

Finally the portion sizes, proportions and sharing concepts were off. All dishes were meant for sharing and as an Asian I'm all for that because that's our culture. But this concept was inconsistently executed. Some items only had one piece of each and we were left wondering how we were to share it. Also, some were canapé-sized portions but others were too big, especially the rice dishes like the chirashi don, unagi scrambled egg donburi, rice bar, etc. They just had too much rice. The field salad was also such a gigantic portion which cannot help but to leave you wondering if they wanted to fill you up with those things rather than the "finer stuff". It would have been much better if everything was served canapé/amuse bouche style and then we could really decide if we wanted repeats or a bigger portion. I think it would have also made the experience much more interesting.

Now to the food. There were obviously hits and misses, but unfortunately for us, more of misses... I was looking forward to the karaage chicken with green tea waffles, because I felt that there was so much potential for a fusion dish, but was left disappointed because the chicken was not really karaage style (typically thigh meat and coated with potato starch) and waffles were not green tea flavour. Instead, what we got was some green tea powder dusted over. The french toast was left out and we requested for the item. Again I was hoping for fluffy Shibuya style thick french toasts, but was again disappointed to see three thin disks with hardly any distinct french toast flavour. The supposed crispy bacon was also replaced by beef with no proper information.

The yellow tail sashimi was also drenched too much in the yuzu dressing. The same was with the field salad. It was so acidic and astringent that we could not eat more than 3-4 leaves of the salad before we had to ask them to return it. We are great yuzu fans, but even that was too much to handle.

The better dishes could hardly be counted as highlights. It would be hard for me to really have a "wow" factor that would compel me to return. The signature Nobu black cod miso could do no wrong. The nigiri sushi was excellent, kudos to the chef for forming the rice so well and at the right temperature. Seared salmon sashimi and beef tataki were also good, as with the tempura (good light batter) and the seemingly humble spinach salad with complexities of flavour.The rest of the dishes were...

Very underwhelming „Dome“ experience.

It started off when our friends tried to reserve the dome. Either they weren’t able to reserve, or they needed to discuss it with the manager or, the system wasn’t working. They told them they would be calling them back to give out more information regarding the reservation. But they never did. My friends had to actively stay in touch with them. And by the time they found someone who was responsible for reserving the Dome, the favourable date was taken. And so some friends couldn’t make it and we had to find an alternative day.

Mind you, we also had to choose which Menu and items a la carte we wanted beforehand, so they could prepare it for us and time manage everything better. The min. Expense was 1500€ for the whole table.

The experience on the day was just so confusing and disappointing. The food was delicious and filling. And that is one reason for a star. The menu was very confusing and we had lots of question. The poor server had to apologised a lot and we had lots of clarifications that evening. Eventually they admitted that they were also confused about the menu and needed to talk to the kitchen staff. Especially after they skipped my friends amuse Bouche. They (a couple) had ordered 3 extra oysters as an Appetizer a la carte. The server thought that those were the amuse bouche. And so did the kitchen? Because the amuse bouche never came and we still had to pay extra for the oyster. Such confusion shouldn’t happen in these kind of a setting.

We also quickly realised, that one of our three servers was a very inexperienced underaged trainee (Auszubildende/r). She also had to wait outside in the cold without a jacket to be on call for us. I honestly didn’t feel very well sitting in the warm while having her stand outside for us. The wrong wine was brought, one dirty plate was served, and after serving us the forth combination of sauces, she cut her explanation short on what it was. She was nonetheless, a very nice young lady and gave her best. But at 22:00h she had to leave because.. well she was underaged. The other server was only there to bring us food and filled our glasses, since he barely spoke any German and (we believe) little English. And our main server (bless his heart) a young lad himself, tried to hold the whole evening together, with all the confusions and mistakes that occurred before and during the evening. He answered all of our questions, was well spoken, and guided us throughout the evening. But we believe that he most likely had just finished his trainee.

Because the whole evening was rather disorganised, and we were less than happy about it, the server surprised us with a bottle of champagne on behalf of the restaurant. Which was very thoughtful of him. We were never trying to be impolite towards the waiter because we knew it wasn’t really their fault. But we had to voice out a lot of things that didn’t work as we expected. Especially if we choose to spend this amount of money. No matter how lovely and helpful the restaurant attendant were - and we really appreciated their time and effort, which is why I gave them another star - we weren’t pleased at all, that the restaurant didn’t feel the need to have experienced staff serve us. But rather made us feel bad for the underaged girl standing in the cold, and bringing up our dismay to a server who tried his best only because the sales and marketing team could plan this properly.

If we spend 1500€ on an evening like this, we expect better organisation that is worth the money. Even though the food was exceptionally delicious I cannot recommend this...

We booked the omakase at Matsuhisa Munich for 135 euros per person — a price point comparable to other omakase experiences we’ve enjoyed across Europe. Given Nobu’s reputation as a renowned Japanese cuisine franchise from New York, with a creative Peruvian influence, we had high expectations. However, the moment we arrived and were seated, I started noticing things felt off.

For those unfamiliar, omakase is a traditional Japanese dining style where the chef prepares a sequence of bite-sized dishes, typically focused on fresh, daily-caught fish, and presented directly at the sushi bar. While in Europe the fish is often flown in rather than locally caught, two elements are key: the freshness of the fish and the personal, live preparation by the chef.

At Nobu, however, the "omakase" turned out to be a Western-style 7-course meal — progressing from salad to cod and steak — rather than a true sushi-driven experience. The menu was hidden under the guise of "chef's choice," but it became clear that it had little to do with the day's catch. There was only one sushi course, featuring just five nigiri pieces. Disappointingly, there were no high-end items like uni (sea urchin), amaebi (sweet shrimp), unagi (eel), or scallop. Although there was a piece of fatty tuna belly, it was of mediocre quality at best.

When the waitress brought out two lacquer bowls at the end of the meal, I briefly hoped for chawanmushi (steamed egg custard), but it turned out to be just a very basic miso soup — a further letdown.

As for the flavor, everything was overwhelmingly salty, perhaps intended to pair with wine. Unfortunately, my husband and I do not drink alcohol, which only made the seasoning feel excessive and unbalanced.

To their credit, the restaurant did bring out an extra dessert to celebrate my birthday, and I appreciated that thoughtful gesture.

Overall, this experience should be advertised honestly as a Western-style 7-course fine dining menu — not omakase. Calling it omakase is truly misleading.

A final thought: my gourmet guru friend in the U.S. once told me she would rather fly to Europe for fine dining than eat in New York City. Here I was, trying a New York restaurant in Europe. Her response? "At least you didn’t have to pay tip." — Haha. I guess that’s one small...