La Maison de la Nature Goh (Fukuoka, JAPAN) ★★★★☆

Like every other family trip, I'm getting my usual 3-hour "Me Time" away from my family. I'm going to put it to good use tonight after I successfully secured my seat at the highly coveted La Maison de la Nature Goh more than two months ago.

After dropping my family off at MARK IS, I took a cab to Nishinakasu where the famed French-Japanese fusion restaurant is located and good thing I did because there was no way I could find this place even with my Google Map app.



Hidden down a small alleyway off Nishinakasu street, La Maison de La Nature Goh is a quiet, charming restaurant offering a daily omakase menu that celebrates Kyushu’s best seasonal produce and locally-raised wagyu.



I must admit, I was a bit scared of walking down the dark alley. This looked more like someone's house.



But once I saw the words “Maison Goh” on the wall, I realized I got the right place (actually my cab driver did).



As soon as I pushed the doors open, a warm, cozy but relatively small dining room was waiting on the other end. I was led to my seat at the counter table where I was immediately greeted by Chef Andy Hiroshi, the right-hand man to Chef-owner Takeshi Fukuyama who was currently in France on business.

La Maison De La Nature Goh is of course founded by owner-chef Takashi Fukuyama. The stylish French-Japanese concept is a regular customer in the Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants List year after year. In fact, they are the only restaurant in Fukuoka to ever crack the list.



Kicking off the meal was one of Chef Fukuyama’s signature dish featuring a chilled broth made with a medley of Kyushu vegetables. At the center of the dish was Japanese mackerel tartare topped beautifully with sliced Kyoho grapes and macadamia nuts.



The palate-soothing broth was the perfect match for the rich and pronounced flavor of the mackerel.



The dish was complemented brilliantly with the sweetness of Kyoho grapes, crunchiness of macadamia nuts and earthy notes of diced vegetables.



The mackerel dish was quickly followed by a collection of nibbles that included sea bream sashimi with seaweed cracker, Japanese rice cookie with foie gras, soy bean powder and brown sugar gel and then a homemade wasabi cookie. 



Last but not least, one of the kitchen’s most popular small bites, homemade quiche with mushrooms, bacon and assorted beans.



Next up was the house specialty, grilled abalone from Nagasaki with shiitake mushrooms and risotto, finished off with a tangy brown butter sauce.



This was incredibly tasty. The abalone was very tender and spongy, combining well with the greenish risotto which has been cooked with abalone liver paste.



The fish course tonight was local lobster, which was hidden underneath a thick foam.



They have obviously put a lot of thoughts into perfecting this foam that was made with chicken stock, butter (lots of it), orange peel and five spices.



This looked like the chef's clever take on Béarnaise sauce which I thought worked really well with the succulent lobster.



My last savory dish was grilled Kuroge beef from Kagoshima. I have been looking forward to this since I stepped through their entrance doors. 



The thick slab of beef was served with braised onion from Awajishima province, celeriac purée and a black pepper sauce that I was sure came with a bit of red wine in it.



This was pretty decent which was probably slightly disappointing given that it's one of the highlights of their omakase menu. Some tendons made it a bit more chewy than I expected.



At this point, we had a break in action before Chef Andy came over for the preparation of my pre-dessert.



He started working on the granita which was made with all these ingredients including ginger, lime, mint and vodka.



Finally, he put a few spoonfuls of the ginger flavored snow onto my small bowl that already had yogurt cream and fruit compote (ginger?) in it.



Ending my meal was miso cream made like a creme brûlée topped with caramel ice-cream, fresh raspberries, sugar bread and soy sauce powder. There's an interesting mix of sweet (sugar bread), savory (soy) and bitter flavors (caramel) in this one.

It was a nice culinary journey that pays homage to the abundance of produce and harvest from Fukuoka, which I enjoyed thoroughly (with the exception of the wagyu). Most impressive of all, we managed to finish this in an hour and a half. That was incredible work of pacing.





Food Rating: 7.5/10
Price: ￥￥￥
Address: 2-26 Nishinakasu, Chuo-ku, Fukuoka, 810-0002 Japan
Closest Metro Station: Tenjin-minami
Tel: +81 (0)92-724-0955
Website: www.gohfukuoka.com/index-e.html
S. Pellegrino Asia's 50 Best Restaurants: 48th (2019)
Opening Hours: 6:00pm - 12:00am (Mon - Sat)