Thank you. It’s actually a long story. I was always fascinated by Japanese culture, but I never imagined I would work with food. As a teenager, I thought I would have a surf school on the beach and spend my life there. I was a pretty problematic kid growing up. One year, I stopped studying just two months after school started. My parents told me, “If you want to do anything, you need to work.” I wanted to go surfing in Morocco that year, so I had to find a job. At the time, my brother worked in a Japanese restaurant, so I started there as a dishwasher. That’s when I fell in love with the kitchen—the anarchy, the adrenaline, the people. Everything about it fascinated me. From that point on, I kept working in food. Later, I had a girlfriend who convinced me to go and study, so I did.

Looking back, that was the turning point in my life. I grew up in a family where food was very important, and I was lucky to eat very well, but I never wanted anything to do with it professionally. Working in that restaurant changed everything.

It was hugely influential. Pakta was a Nikkei restaurant run by Albert Adrià and Ferran Adrià. Nikkei cuisine itself has a fascinating history. It goes back to agreements between Peru and Japan, when Japanese immigrants came to Peru to help develop agriculture. Over time, Japanese and Peruvian cultures blended, creating what we now know as Nikkei culture and cuisine. I was lucky to work at Pakta, and also at Tickets. Later, I left when they were opening Enigma. That experience completely changed the way I see restaurants and kitchens, especially in terms of organisation and methodology. I learned how to think about food, not just creatively, but structurally.

Creativity alone isn’t enough if you don’t have a framework behind it. It taught me how to approach products, concepts, and restaurant operations with much more clarity.

Both, but the philosophy resonates deeply with me.

I’m drawn to the minimalism and the respect for the product. The idea is not to transform something beyond recognition, but rather to preserve its essence and make it a little better.

Over time, I also made it somewhat of a personal mission to teach people about Japanese food. There are so many misconceptions. Many people think Japanese cuisine is just sushi, when sushi is only a very small part of it.

I want to introduce people to the broader culture, techniques, and traditions of Japanese cooking. Even tonight, you’re going to try a dish that is extremely Japanese. We were actually worried it might be too Japanese for people to enjoy, but guests have been responding really well to it. It uses a traditional technique that you rarely see outside Japan.

The concept is actually very simple. Omakase means placing yourself in someone else’s hands. You sit down and surrender yourself to the chef. You trust that person to serve what they believe is best. People often compare it to a tasting menu, and in some ways it is. But omakase is broader than that. It can take many forms depending on the style of Japanese cooking. You can have a tempura omakase, focused entirely on tempura. You can have a sushi omakase.

You can have kappo cuisine, where you experience multiple Japanese cooking techniques. Or it can simply mean that you trust the chef to serve whatever is best for that season, that day, or that particular moment. At its core, it’s about trust.

We change the menu seasonally. Within each season, there are also what we could call micro-seasons. Certain products may only be at their peak for a few weeks. For example, we’re currently working with white asparagus. It’s a summer ingredient, but not one that lasts throughout the entire season.

So while the overall menu remains seasonal, individual dishes and ingredients evolve continuously depending on what’s at its best.

Absolutely.

In Portugal especially, many people still think omakase simply means an expensive sushi menu. That’s not really what it is.

International guests often arrive with a broader understanding of the concept, but locally there’s still some confusion. Omakase is a whole philosophy and a way of dining. It’s not limited to one format or one sequence of dishes.

Exactly. Tonight, for example, you’ll eat a nigiri topped with medai. At first glance, it may seem like nothing more than a piece of fish over rice. But behind that fish there can be an entire process of ageing, curing, preservation, seaweed treatment, soy curing, and many other techniques. This applies to almost everything we serve. It may appear simple, but the team has often been working since nine in the morning preparing every element. Simplicity in Japanese cuisine is rarely simple.

I’d like to believe that more and more people do. Of course, there are always guests who simply want to take a photo and say they’ve been here. That happens everywhere. But increasingly, both Portuguese guests and international visitors are becoming genuinely interested in Japanese cuisine and culture. They want to understand what they’re eating and why. That’s very rewarding.

Yes, and I actually think it’s a very accurate comparison. Kappo is highly theatrical. Everything follows a precise rhythm and sequence. It’s almost like a performance or a dance. Every movement has a purpose. Izakaya is the opposite. It’s noisy, energetic, and a little chaotic. Organised chaos, but chaos nonetheless. It’s more punk rock. People often tell me these two places reflect different sides of my personality, and I think they’re right. I become a slightly different person depending on which restaurant I’m working in.

Creativity can start from many different places. Sometimes it begins with a technique I want to explore. Sometimes with a product that’s in season. Sometimes even with the plate itself. The season is always important, but there’s never a single formula. We might start with a specific ingredient and then ask what works best with it. Or we might start with a technique and then look for the right product to apply it to. The process changes constantly.

Yes. Kappo cuisine is built around two fundamental ideas. The first is the counter. There is a direct connection between the guest and the person cooking and serving the food. That relationship is essential. The second is the progression of techniques. The menu moves through different forms of cooking—from raw preparations to steamed dishes, grilled dishes, and beyond. At Izakaya, the philosophy is different. Izakaya is about sharing, drinking, and socialising. The food is designed to accompany drinks. That’s the essence of an izakaya. We also wanted to remain very faithful to traditional Japanese izakaya culture, particularly with our yakitori programme. We use different parts of the chicken exactly as they do in Japan—the heart, the top of the heart, various skin cuts, and many other parts. We stay very traditional in that sense, while allowing ourselves small twists where appropriate.

I don’t really like the word hybrid. What we do is Japanese food made with Portuguese ingredients. We’re not trying to merge Portuguese cooking techniques with Japanese cooking. That’s not our objective. Sometimes the two cultures naturally intersect because of historical connections between Portugal and Japan. In those cases, there’s a story behind the dish. But generally speaking, we cook Japanese food using Portuguese products.

I would be a hypocrite if I said yes. You can be deeply respectful of tradition. You can study the culture, the techniques, and the philosophy. But you are still outside Japan. It’s the same as trying to recreate Portuguese cuisine in Tokyo. It may be excellent, but it will always be different from experiencing it in Portugal. Our goal is not to replicate Japan perfectly. Our goal is to honour it as respectfully and faithfully as possible.

Rice is certainly one of them.When it comes to sushi, I often say that 80% of sushi is rice. Good fish can be purchased by many people. Perfect sushi rice is much harder to achieve. Vegetables are also incredibly important. Eggs are important. But above all, Japanese culture is obsessed with quality. There is an extraordinary commitment to making every product as good as it can possibly be. That pursuit of excellence applies to everything.

Without a doubt. Because we work across a counter, there is constant communication with our guests. Whenever people are interested, we try to explain what we do, where techniques come from, and what makes something traditional. Of course, some guests simply want to enjoy their meal, and that’s perfectly fine. But whenever people are curious, we want to help them understand Japanese food more deeply and distinguish between what is authentic, what is traditional, and what makes this cuisine so special.