Our guest is Phillip Frankland Lee who is the chef/owner of Sushi by Scratch. Sushi by Scratch Restaurants began in Los Angeles and New York marks its tenth location, which opened in September 2024.

Phillip is known for innovative omakase-style sushi preparations, while still respecting the values set by sushi masters. For example, he uses premium seafood mostly from the Toyosu Market in Japan and he imports rice from Toyoama Prefecture and mills it in-house. On the other hand, he pays homage to his American upbringing by flavoring hamachi yellowtail with sweet corn pudding and topped with a sprinkle of sourdough breadcrumbs.

Sushi has come a long way in the U.S. since the 1960s when it was introduced to the general public for the first time. Sushi is now one of the most popular foods in the U.S. and great talents like Phillip seem to be making it uniquely American.

Our guest is George Kao who is the head of sales at Boken Sake https://www.drinkboken.com/　based in New York. Boken Sake is a unique concept. The company collaborates with authentic Japanese sake breweries and produces sake under the Boken brand.

Many sake breweries consider expanding to overseas markets, but a lot of them are family-owned small businesses without enough resources to make it happen. Boken can effectively create a path for them to get into the American market and American consumers can have opportunities to taste their precious craft sake.

George is an ideal talent to execute Boken’s mission with his rich and unique background in Japanese food, in particular Japanese sake.

In this episode, we will discuss the unique concept of Boken Sake, the sake Boken has produced with a 540-year-old brewery, great ways to enjoy sake with non-Japanese food and much, much more!!!

Our guest is Ririko Tatsumi who is the founder of Annn based in New York. Annn is truly a unique concept. Traditional Japanese sweets are called Wagashi. One of Wagashi’s key ingredients is An, or Anko, a bean paste made with different kinds of beans from red, and white to green. Not just colors, their flavors are diverse and it is fun to discover how simple beans can create rich flavors in Japanese sweets. That is why Ririko decided to introduce the charm of An to a global audience in the modern American context.

In this episode, we will discuss what An is, what types of An you can enjoy, how traditional An can be creative in the context of global sweet recipes and much, much more!!!