Top Japanese chef shares why Hong Kong will always be special to him
Shinichiro Takagi, the second-generation chef-owner of Zeniya in Kanazawa, Japan, recalls travelling to Hong Kong with his father – the first and last trip before his death
Tell us about your childhood. “Zeniya was started by my parents in 1970, the year I was born. When I was growing up I didn’t spend a lot of time with my parents, my father in particular, because chefs work from early morning to late at night. On Sundays he liked to play golf, so Sunday dinners were so important to me because that was the one time during the week we had together. We lived upstairs from the restaurant and I could watch my father working. He was very strict, but I had many questions for him. I only talked to him twice about food, once when I was about 13, and two years later.
“The first time [I asked him a question] was when my father was happy, maybe because he played golf well. I asked him, ‘Can you prepare sashimi?’ That was because I had never seen him slice fish, because he was the executive chef, with more than 10 chefs under him. He then prepared sashimi hirame [flounder] straight from the tank, but it wasn’t what we usually ate. I couldn’t tell him it was good – the texture was good but not the taste. But he was smiling saying I was right because although the fish was fresh, it needed to be aged a few hours. I didn’t understand what he meant until years later.
“The second time I asked him to cook for me he made fried rice and it was good. I asked him how he could cook Chinese. He said he had been to Hong Kong and Taiwan a lot to enjoy Chinese food.”
How did you get into cooking? “When I was 16 I went to New York to study for a year. Then I went to college back home and studied for a bachelor’s degree in commercial science – you can learn a lot of things like marketing and labour law, which is why I chose it. I had no idea what I wanted to do after graduation but, in 1991, my father passed away and, three years later, I decided to become a chef. I was a senior in college.”
Why is Hong Kong special to you? “The year before my father died, I travelled with him to Hong Kong. That was my first and last trip with him. We were in Hong Kong for three days. He would play golf during the day with his good friend, a Japanese banker, and I walked around Tsim Sha Tsui until dinnertime, waiting for them. I bought some snacks on the street. I don’t remember what they were, but they were sweet.”