One of my favorite tricky-to-translate Japanese words is mottainai. The term roughly echoes the old chestnut “Waste not, want not” but more broadly expresses the Japanese knack of turning trash into treasure. Nowhere is mottainai more elegantly expressed than in the kitchen. Sake lees become kasujiru, a delicious winter soup; fish heads and skeletons simmer into rich stocks; and vegetable peels reincarnate as pickles, preserves, and garnishes.
Among New York City chefs, the grand master of mottainai hails not from the Land of the Rising Sun but the land of soccer and samba. Sherry Cardoso, a young chef from Minas Gerais, has made low-waste cooking a central pillar of Cynthia, her new restaurant in the West Village. Her tasting menu, changing with the seasons, might include caramel flan with a haunting sulfurous kiss from onion peels, a Negroni enlivened with oil extracted from lemon rinds, or a wondrously funky XO sauce conjured from a hodgepodge of veggie unmentionables. After stints at Per Se, Brooklyn Fare, and Top Chef, Chef Cardoso has discovered the culinary Philosopher’s Stone—the alchemical sorcery to transmute the base into the precious.
A Dazzling Tasting Menu from a Real Scrappy Chef
I went to see the magic show last week, venturing from Bushwick to that Oz of matcha lattes, peppy young blondes, and regal brownstones also known as the West Village. On the subway across the East River, I pondered whether, as a man on the cusp of forty, I was finally entering my Sex and the City era. Cynthia’s tasting menu is a serious degustation, so I invited my pal Rob—a fellow writer who holds elite chefs in the same esteem my Catholic mother reserves for saints.
The dining room was small and warmly lit, with large windows looking out onto Jones Street. It was a full house, yet Rob and I could hear each other as easily as if we were sitting on my patio. Cynthia also has a tiny three- or four-seat bar, which I duly noted would make for a slam-dunk date spot.
We selected libations—the Mar-T and T, a martini with Scottish gin and a speared candied kumquat, and Mr. Rhabarbaro, a fizzer with rhubarb, sunchoke, and honey—and settled in for the gastronomic odyssey. The opening salvo was a tostada with fluke crudo and vatapá—a saffron-hued Bahian paste of shrimp, coconut milk, and palm oil—along with a waffle rosette with uni. Shortly after came a deliriously rich corn custard topped with Ossetra caviar and foie gras. Next, a trio of veggie-peel-infused bread rolls in rainbow-sherbet hues, ringed by a mélange of butters, jams, and pickles. Through the deluge of dopamine, I recall our waitress shaving black truffles over a lobster tail bathed in red curry.
I often lack the sitzfleisch for long tasting menus, but the six courses at Cynthia passed like childhood summer vacation: you know it has to end, but you want to believe it will last forever. Like an aproned yagé shaman, Chef Cardoso eased us back to normal consciousness with a two-stage dessert. First, a palate-cleansing bowl of sorbet and granita, then mignardises of candied kiwi, brigadeiro, and a dark chocolate petit four. There was even lagniappe to take home: tiny jars of lemon-pit jam and kosho-infused butter.
On the walk to the West 4th Street station, I ranted to Rob about mottainai, how the Japanese custom of minimizing waste stems from Shinto. I then attempted to articulate a theory that economy of material was just as deeply embedded in Brazilian culture—as evinced by the bikinis on Ipanema Beach. Rob looked confused, but he thanked me once again for one of our most memorable meals together.
