Takashiya

Beneath a South Brisbane hotel, a twelve-seat room has become the city's most serious argument for omakase. The chef, Takashi Nami, came by way of the Valley's better Japanese kitchens, and the format here is uncompromising: two seatings a night, and a degustation that runs somewhere between sixteen and nineteen courses. The ingredient list reads like a manifesto for the top of the market, live lobster, Northern Bluefin tuna, A5 Kagoshima wagyu, foie gras and caviar among them, much of it processed and packed in Japan before it reaches the counter. The room is built for immersion rather than volume, dressed with cherry blossom, Japanese artwork and lanterns fashioned from sake bottles, an aesthetic that could tip into theatre but stays on the right side of it. Diners sit close to the chef, the meal unfolding at his pace across a long, deliberate evening. A larger bar and restaurant handles the overflow, but the intimate counter is the point, the seat where the cooking is watched as much as eaten. In a city still building its fine-dining reputation, it stands as one of the more ambitious rooms going, and among the harder tables to secure.