Comfort's Not a Chore: Notes from Masaki Sugisaki

Somewhere in between Chelsea and Knightsbridge, on a mews tucked away from the hustle and bustle of the city, is Dinings SW3. Led by Masaki Sugisaki, who here wears our signature chore jacket, we spent the afternoon in the warmth of his hospitality — or Omotenashi — where we learned that comfort, at the heart of his ethos, should never feel like hard work.

Masaki Sugisaki "has been working in this market for a long, long time!" When he first started out, "true Japanese culture was a little bit early for this market, because it was a totally different culture." Combining Japanese cooking philosophy with the history of British food, Masaki conceptualised Dinings SW3, where the aim is to provide "the highest possible quality of food, in the most comfortable atmosphere."

Comfort is a priority, the Executive Chef elaborates, creating "the right atmosphere to have a fun dining experience." What he wants "is for the guests to first of all feel really comfortable, almost like eating in your own dining room." Japanese cuisine, he reflects, can be daunting, from new flavour profiles, to misunderstandings around menu terminology. For this, Masaki favours what he terms "translation: where Japanese classics are translated into the European format." Usuzuruki — or a thinly sliced, white fish sashimi — becomes the Italian carpaccio. Masaki laughs, "people can be kind of scared when they don't know what they are ordering!" Sincerely, however, this is a belief rooted in wanting everyone "to understand, and to feel comfortable."

Masaki translates concepts not only across language but techniques and flavours, seasoning and ingredients. Balsamic vinegar, he enthuses, "has so much flavour and history behind it." Even though not traditionally favoured in Japanese cooking, "if you understand it correctly, we can create a Japanese flavour by utilising local ingredients."

Locality and seasonality are fundamental to the ethos that he has translated from Japanese cooking philosophy onto European ingredients; "in Japanese cuisine, we don't chase for all year around availability." In Japan, Masaki explains, there are three seasons that you represent in each dish: the current season, the season that has preceded it, and the season ahead. Not only important to how we enjoy the flavour of a dish, but how we respond to our environment more broadly; we need to change, Masaki suggests, our wider perception and our mentality that every ingredient is always available. It's important to teach, through cooking and flavour, ingredient and preparation, an approach to seasonality that protects and celebrates the environment.

Seasonality pays respect to the ingredients; "In Japanese we say itadakimasu, when you start eating, which means, you know, thank you very much for the lives we will be consuming now." Not only applicable to vegetables, Masaki enthuses, guiding us to his passion for gill-to-tail dining. Maximising the potential of the ingredient is to respect it" he explains, recalling stories of his father checking the bin for any edible parts of a fish. Taking the common Japanese practice of using the entire fish, Masaki applies it to the finest quality seafood sourced directly from the dayboats that trawl the South West coastline, taking multiple trips each year to spend time on the boats with the fisherman. "You cannot cook an ingredient without respecting it" he emphasises.

How do we, Masaki asks, utilise, and respect, the whole fish? "The head, bones, whatever, it's all part of the fish." With this question a core principle of Dinings SW3, nothing is wasted, with an innovative and imaginative approach taken to using every part of every ingredient. Tartar chips, for example, a Dinings SW3 signature, are developed from excess fish left on the bone; "no matter how skilled you are as a chef", Masaki emphasises, "there's always something left on the bone!" Instead of ignoring this, the Dinings SW3 team rescue this remaining flesh, setting it delicately on a small potato taco.

Dishes such as these seek to answer to question he poses to us, "but why do I need to throw it away?" Light heartedly asked by the smiling chef, it remains a serious one, rooted in his personal philosophy and wider environmental preoccupations. Translating complex questions into simple answers, just as he translates the unfamiliar into the comfortable, Masaki Sugisaki teaches that understanding underpins enjoyment, and that comfort comes from culture, collaboration, and connectivity.