Is Epilogue the final word in Manila’s bistro scene?

Take a Manila-style European bistro, add five Japanese chefs and the Food Revolution restaurant group, and you get Epilogue. Located on the ground floor of S Maison, Conrad Manila, it’s a fine bistro with its own pasta, meat and pastry chefs. The presence of five Japanese specialists — chef Kenji Ishihara and chef Minoru Sorimachi (chef directors), chef Tomohide Ono (head baker), and chef Hayato Mitsuhashi (Italian cuisine specialist) and Food Revolution consultant Hiroyuki Meno — may throw you for a moment. The menu, after all, features very few Japanese touches or nods. But once you understand that the chefs all trained and worked extensively in Europe, the connection makes more sense. Food Revolution, after all, is known for its innovative katsudon and ramen concepts here in Manila.

Set in a modern-design interior created by Japanese architect Kazumasa Wakabayashi to seat over 100, Epilogue strives to reinvent the bistro. Media and guests invited to the launch were treated to a special menu (items not on the regular lineup) whipped up by a team of specialty chefs — an A-Team of bistro cuisine, if you will.

Head baker Ono, a pastry chef for 20 years, has worked in famous bakeries in Japan, Indonesia and Hong Kong. He uses local touches like pandan flour to devise some of the cakes to match Filipino tastes. (Epilogue also has an extensive bakery, with everything from pizza slices to fresh breads and pastries for takeaway.)

Chef Mitsuhashi is the pasta master, having trained in Umbria, Italy, before working in Italian restos in Japan, Indonesia and Italy for over 14 years. For Epilogue, he created new gnocchi, risotto and pasta dishes using fresh local ingredients.

Of the two chef directors, chef Ishihara has 30 years’ experience creating beautiful cakes in France, Japan and Indonesia; he brings his A-game to Epilogue. Chef director Sorimachi, meanwhile, is dubbed a steak master, with two decades working in well-known teppanyaki steakhouses in Japan as well as his own steakhouse in Jakarta.

Chef Meno was brought aboard to refine the concept of Epilogue, and his French cuisine experience — in various Michelin-starred restaurants such as Domaine Les Haut Roches in Loire, Le Pont de Ciel in Osaka, L’Auberge De L’ill in Tokyo, as well being executive chef at Brasserie Paul Bocuse and the one-Michelin-star Maison Paul Bocuse in Tokyo — speaks for itself.

?Not really interested in adding to Manila’s already crowded Japanese food landscape, Epilogue instead brings a fresh take on haute cuisine. As Food Revolution marketing manager Erika Lim says, “The style is more European but with some Japanese influences, like the way the chicken is cooked sous-vide, grilled, then uses a Japanese spice, yuzukosh?,” or fermented chili pepper with salt. “The concept is not so much Japanese ingredients or techniques,” says Food Revolution president Alyanna Uy. “Since they’re European-trained and -influenced, it’s more about elevating local ingredients.”

The Japan influence comes in their kodawari, or Japanese dedication to craft and mastery. “It’s their dedication to discovering local flavors and the care that goes into preparation that they bring,” says Uy.

From the opening appetizers of watermelon gazpacho with poached prawn (fresh flavors resound), escabeche (using local dilis flavored with calamansi set in a fluffy curry cauliflower mousse) and a little square of focaccia with prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella (highlighting the soft breads of chef Ono), you know that highlighting local flavors and specialized preparation is key to Epilogue’s concept.

A trio of entrees included a consommé royal (braised gy?tan and chayote egg pudding enmeshed in a foie gras ravioli and mushroom foam using Eryngii mushrooms — unusual, and purportedly a “superfood”); a catfish croquette with a sublime Pernod-saffron sauce, with moringa-coated watercress slices and jicama); and a slab of smoked duck coated in red wine-dalandan Béarnaise sauce.

We wrapped things up with a delicious nougat ice enveloped in a pain d’epices (or French “spiced bread”) crust, met with a refreshing passion-fruit sorbet and raspberry coulis. With this much firepower in the kitchen, we can only wish to explore the menu further.

Food Revolution is known for innovative food concepts. Says Uy: “Epilogue is a standalone, homegrown bistro. We really concentrate on everything from recipe development to design ideas.” Note the menu, laid out like sections of a book (entries like “Introduction” for appetizers, “Title Page” for soups and salads, “Foreword” for pizzas). Then there’s the concept of multiple chefs, not usually done in Manila. Unlike the well-known saying about “too many cooks,” Epilogue operates as a team. “It’s not like they compete; each has a purpose, so they complement each other,” says Uy.

Highlighting local flavors was the special touch brought by chef Meno.  “He wanted to bring special attention to Filipino ingredients on his menu — you can see it in dalandan, calamansi, malunggay, hito, lapu-lapu.”

Chef Meno travels as far as Navotas markets in the early hours for fresh fish and produce. “In the future, we will have a ‘special menu’ where you can reserve in advance with a main ingredient in mind, and the chefs will design a special meal for 20 guests for more,” says Uy. 

For now, Epilogue’s set menu is extensive — and intriguing — enough to bring Manila foodies out to see if this is, indeed, the final word in Manila bistro dining.

* * *

Epilogue, a homegrown brand under the Food Revolution Group, is located on the Ground Floor, S Maison, Conrad Manila, Ocean Drive, Pasay City. Visit epilogue.ph to explore the menu and learn more.