I secured a table at NOBU way before it opened. What can I say? I bought into the hype. I thought if I didn’t book one that early, I wouldn’t be able to get one for months. My reservation was for the first Saturday after its opening – a pretty hot table, really; so hot I couldn’t help but exercise my bragging rights. “Who wants to come?!” I boasted in a mass email. I had two friends fly back early from their holiday to make the 7:15pm seating. (I should note that they only take reservations for 7:15pm and 9:30pm. The prime 8:00pm seating is reserved for, well, people who don’t need to make reservations, I guess.)
Unfortunately, a last-minute self-destruction had me fleeing Hong Kong on the big day, so I decided to give my reservation to my friend Stephan. It felt like I was doing him a tremendous favor, like giving him the title papers to my car. But when I called to transfer the reservation from my name to his, we were met with questions and skepticism. Nobu, like many of Hong Kong’s hot spots, have brought in a new army of reservationists - part-gatekeeper, part-door bitch. Their job is to divide callers into two groups: those who can land a great table on their busiest nights, and those who can’t. We were edging towards the latter.
I understand hot tables are hard to come by – that is, after all, why they’re “hot.” But there are ways to get reservations, even at the dining darling of the moment. What you need to understand is people with access play by a different set of rules. And here they are...
Be a regular: A good maître d’ will always know when a regular walks in. All it takes to be a regular is to pop by the restaurant once a week for three consecutive weeks. If you’ve had a really good experience, let someone at the front desk know about it. Making friendly with the maître d’ will land you a great table the next time he spots your name in the reservation book. Tried and tested.
That’s the hard way. The easy way is to lie. Call and tell them you are holding a special celebration (birthday, engagement, dad’s 90th...) and ask for a special table. But be careful here because, as a good liar, you will need to produce the goods (like a 90-year-old man). We’ve pulled this trick once and the manager came out with a massive birthday cake and a retinue of singing waiters when all we wanted was a decent table. We lived through it and enjoyed free cake, but just make sure everyone is in on the scam or you’ll have pie all over your face.
Or you can just buy your way in - that's always an option. To never be caught without a table again, join a concierge service like Quintessentially, or become a member at the dining club. But as my friend, a shareholder at M1NT, says, “Even I can’t always get a table.”