Ginza is a fascinating town, frequently linked with special moments and fond memories. Visits to department stores while holding tightly to a parent’s hand, afternoons in old-fashioned cafés run by one-of-a-kind characters, first dates in special restaurants . . . Ginza is a place like no other.

Hanatsubaki’s “Ginza Memoir” series, hosted by Yoshiyuki Morioka of the iconic Morioka Shoten bookstore, explores the multifaceted nature and universal appeal of Ginza through interviews with guests from a wide variety of fields. With Morioka as guide to Ginza’s hidden charms and diverse narratives, new discoveries await around every corner.

Our third guest for “Ginza Memoir” is Olivier Chaignon, executive chef of the three-star French restaurant L’Osier. In the second half of our conversation, we discuss the many skills contemporary chefs are expected to master outside the kitchen and Chaignon’s secret idea for a gastronomic project that could use Ginza as home base.

(Read Part 1 here.)

All to Provide the Guest with a Special Experience

Morioka: Our conversation has brought home for me the sheer range of tasks today’s chefs are expected to master. In addition to the culinary side of things, you are also responsible for the restaurant’s overall direction; in your case, you even work with primary producers to improve their soil. It must be a very challenging profession.

Chaignon: I suppose so. We chefs work with our hands first and foremost, but we also need the ability to lead a team, and these days PR skills are required as well. I even choose staff uniforms and order tableware designs. One recent task I handled was creating a plate with an abstract camellia petal design.

Morioka: That sounds like an art director.

Chaignon: I even designed our dessert wagon. I had it custom-made with drawers that could open above the tables our guests sit at. In that sense, chefs are expected to have a range of abilities.

Morioka: The role of chef is clearly changing with the times. What do you see as the requirements for a good chef today?

Chaignon: First of all, the ability to find good ingredients. That requirement is the same in every age. In addition, I see growing demand for the ability to collaborate with producers. Developing new recipes using produce from a particular region or farm increases that region or farm’s value. With respect to microbiome farming, researchers sometimes struggle to convince farmers to change the way they have always done things, but if a chef approaches the same farmers, they may be more willing to listen.

Morioka: In other words, proactive engagement with improving the ecosystem as a whole.

Chaignon: Did you know that there is a saffron farm in Kyushu? In some parts of Kyushu, drinking hot water infused with saffron when feeling unwell is a cultural tradition. Like traditional Chinese medicine. But few people know that saffron is produced in Japan at all. I believe that shining the spotlight on unknown domestic production areas like this is also part of my role. In some saffron-producing countries, the production process is linked to social problems, but that is not a problem for domestic saffron. It tastes good, it’s healthy—it has countless benefits.

Morioka: Future chefs might work outside restaurants.

Chaignon: But that was not the initial goal. All of these initiatives began from the desire to provide a special experience to L’Osier’s guests.

Future Gastronomy—From Ginza to the World

Morioka: I have heard that L’Osier has no “traditional menu items” that date to its founding.

Chaignon: That’s correct. Tradition is important, of course. But I feel that change is also part of running a restaurant. Some restaurants offer their most acclaimed menu items as “specialties,” but in my opinion it is the guests who decide what a restaurant’s specialty is, not the restaurant itself.

Morioka: How did you come to think that way?

Chaignon: We do serve the same food if that is what a guest requests, but as a general rule we strive to always offer new culinary ideas. The same goes for our service and our interiors. Change is the baseline. Some of our guests come several times a month, and I want them to discover something new every time.

Morioka: Providing a new experience to regulars on every visit sounds challenging.

Chaignon: Not everything can be changed, of course, but we can add some novelty. For that reason, we always record when our diners came and what they eat.

Morioka: That’s remarkable.

Chaignon: Changing the menu also keeps our team motivated. Doing the same thing over and over gets dull, after all. Even when we use the same ingredients, we often change the preparation method.

Morioka: Do you have any particular ideas you hope to adopt at L’Osier in future?

Chaignon: I want to use food education for children to change how consumers think about produce. Japanese supermarkets are full of fruits and vegetables of uniform shape and size in neat rows. You never see crooked carrots or wrinkled tomatoes. But even produce that looks less appealing has the same flavour and nutritional value. I want to change attitudes around that. My focus is on children because they are the consumers of the future. They ought to know what the fruits and vegetables they eat truly look like.

Morioka: It would be nice if there were a place in Ginza to use as a base for this.

Chaignon: In the future, I am hoping to create a space in Ginza where people can taste ingredients gathered from farms using microbiome farming all over the country. A place people could harvest produce and children could try crooked carrots raw.

Morioka: That sounds fascinating.

Chaignon: The facility could also handle processed foods as well as raw vegetables. It would be good to have somewhere that received vegetables and processed foods from producers and sent profits back in return. We can’t use every ingredient at L’Osier, but if a farm is willing to embrace microbiome farming methods, I would be eager to cooperate as much as possible, in the spirit of the “Sixth Industrialization.” I hope that this movement will draw in participants from many different cultures in the future.

Morioka: What do you call this movement?

Chaignon: I haven’t decided on a name yet. I’ll have to think about that.

Olivier Chaignon
Olivier Chaignon selects the finest ingredients from France and Japan and combines them in new ways to create delicate flavours and textures that expressing his unique sensibility through sublime harmony. After working at Taillevent and Pierre Gagnaire in Paris, Chaignon came to Japan in 2005 as executive chef of Pierre Gagnaire a Tokyo. In 2013, he joined L’Osier as executive chef. From 2015 to 2018, L’Osier received two stars in the Tokyo Michelin Guide. In Gault & Millau Tokyo 2017, Chaignon won the Chef of the Year award. In the 2019 edition of the Tokyo Michelin Guide, L’Osier received three stars, and it has retained that rating for six years running—so far.
https://losier.shiseido.co.jp/

Yoshiyuki Morioka
Born 1974 in Yamagata. Head of the Morioka Shoten bookstore. Writer. Published books include Around Ginza in 800 Days (Bunshun Bunko) and Forgiving the Shortcake (Raichosha). Also active as an art curator, with recent shows including Children and Radiation, the second stage of an exhibition held jointly with the University of the Sacred Heart (October 30, 2003–April 22, 2024).
https://www.instagram.com/moriokashoten/?hl=ja

Sogo Hiraiwa
Editor/writer
Born 1990 in Takayama, Gifu. Freelance editor and writer contributing regularly to literary, cultural, and fashion magazines. Also involved in planning and editing books, including the Japanese edition of Octavia E. Butler’s Bloodchild and Other Stories (trans. Hikaru Fujii). Translator of Virgil Abloh’s Dialogues (Adachi Press).
https://www.instagram.com/sogohiraiwa/

Nathalie Cantacuzino
Photographer
Born in Stockholm, Sweden. Studied Japanese culture and photographic technique in Tokyo. Shoots in genres ranging from fashion to documentary and lifestyle.
https://www.instagram.com/nanorie/