In Kyoto, Chef Jacob Kear forages the mountains surrounding LURRA each day and cooks over a wood fired hearth to create bold, elemental expressions of season and place. At Nisei, his collaboration menu traced the line between Japanese and Californian ingredients, bringing his fire focused cuisine into intimate conversation with Chef David Yoshimura’s approach to modern kaiseki.

For this AAPI Heritage collaboration, Nisei welcomed Chef Tim Jacob, a San Francisco based chef whose resume includes time as CDC at Lazy Bear, together with Chef Lordfer Lalicon of Kaya in Orlando, a Michelin Green Star Filipino restaurant. The dinner explored Filipino and Californian flavors through a Japanese lens, highlighting shared ideas of hospitality, community, and stewardship of ingredients.

Honolulu’s Bar Maze is known for cocktail paired tasting menus that weave together Japanese, Korean, and Hawaiian influences. At Nisei, Chef Ki Chung and the team built a progression where each course and pairing echoed Bar Maze’s playful precision while aligning with Nisei’s focus on seasonality and quiet, detailed technique.

Chef Aisha Ibrahim, formerly executive chef of Canlis in Seattle, brings a global resume shaped by kitchens from Manresa and Azurmendi to her own modern Filipino narrative. For Nisei’s AAPI series, she crafted a menu that honored her roots in Mindanao while engaging in dialogue with Nisei’s Japanese American point of view, reflecting on migration, identity, and shared technique at the table.

Arbor in Hong Kong pairs Nordic roots with Japanese sensibilities, earning two Michelin stars for its nature driven tasting menu. At Nisei, Chef Eric Raty and Chef David Yoshimura built a collaborative dinner that threaded preserved and foraged ingredients through both kitchens, balancing Nordic clarity with the nuance of Japanese stock work and California produce.

Bangkok’s Le Du, led by Chef Thitid “Ton” Tassanakajohn, celebrates modern Thai cuisine through seasonal tasting menus grounded in the ingredients of the Chao Phraya River basin. For this Nisei collaboration, the team explored how Thai aromatics, spice, and rice traditions converse with Japanese technique and Northern California product, creating a weeklong series that moved between Bangkok and San Francisco in flavor.

Florilege in Tokyo is known for its French Japanese tasting menus and plant forward, sustainability focused cooking. At Nisei, Chef Hiroyasu Kawate joined Chef David Yoshimura in a collaborative menu that put vegetables and thoughtful sourcing at the center, tracing a path between Tokyo and San Francisco through shared ideas of craft, responsibility, and playful reimagining of classic forms.

Sons and Daughters is a San Francisco restaurant where Chef Harrison Cheney expresses a New Nordic inspired tasting menu through California ingredients, with a deep interest in fermentation, preservation, and delicate sauces. The collaboration with Nisei brought two Polk and Nob Hill neighbors together, layering Nordic structure and Japanese kaiseki rhythms into a single night in the dining room.

Tokyo’s Den, led by Chef Zaiyu Hasegawa, is celebrated for a warm, humorous take on kaiseki that never loses technical rigor. At Nisei, the collaboration became a conversation between two generations of Japanese restaurants, blending Den’s playful signatures with Nisei’s intimate, quiet style to show how joy, hospitality, and precision can sit at the same table.

Oriole in Chicago’s West Loop is a two Michelin star contemporary American restaurant built around Chef Noah Sandoval’s tasting menu. For this collaborative dinner at Nisei, the teams explored how Oriole’s layered, nostalgic flavors and Midwestern sensibility could meet Nisei’s Japanese American perspective, creating courses that moved between Chicago and San Francisco in texture and tone.

Eika in Taipei is Chef Ryohei Hieda’s expression of Japanese cooking through Taiwanese ingredients, a two Michelin star restaurant where local produce and gentle, precise technique define the menu. At Nisei, the collaboration highlighted the shared language between Taiwan and Japan, and between Eika’s fruit driven, quietly inventive cooking and Nisei’s Northern California interpretation of kaiseki.