Black is a theme at Kuro. It’s there in the gleaming marble tabletops, in the food and in the cocktails. Take a seat at the bar, order a Never Say Never, and the focus is not on how the tropical fruit flavours meld subtly with yellow Chartreuse, Pocari Sweat and bitters, but on how the drink is coloured jet-black save for a sprig of mint protruding from the ice. Order the fried chicken and the coating is as pitch dark as the chiffon cake on the snacks menu.
Kuro means ‘black’ in Japanese, so the colour play is fun, but it’s far from the most interesting detail. Better to focus less on the colour of the cocktails, for example, than on the skills of bartending duo Yasuhiro Kawakubo and Fumiamku Michishita whose sharp movements and striking uniforms (white coat for one; vest and button-down with sleeve cuffs for the other) do plenty for the cause of craft Japanese cocktail-making in Sydney. Or, better still, on the moves of the kitchen, which aims to evolve Japanese tradition into something more current.
That second task falls to executive chef Taka Teramoto and his head chef Nobu Maruyama. Both have worked at restaurants that marry Japanese and Western ideas, and they continue the thread here. In practice this means turning something like super-fluffy Japanese chiffon cake into blini-like bases for nori crème fraîche and marinated salmon roe; or taking chicken karaage in more of a chicken-tenders direction by using breast in place of thigh then topping it with sour umeboshi and crisp-fried bonito flakes. The texture of the first may be a little disconcerting, and the breast lands on the drier side, but there’s no arguing with the flavours.
Good ideas and ambition abound. The design is consistently striking, with soft lighting, lines of oak beams covering raw brick and details that draw the hand and eye in the glasses, chairs and plateware. In the AM, light pours in from the street and a Brew Bar rises from the front counter, which serves coffee made with all the precision of the tiniest Omotesando café, and sweets like banana bread with caramel mascarpone to match. A ten-seat chef’s table, Teramoto, is due to launch soon, too.
For now, the kitchen turns vegetable scraps into a crumbly coating for the wagyu tsukune, which resembles a sort of coarse-minced rissole on a stick, in a good way. Duck, sauced with umeboshi jus, arrives as both sliced blush-pink breast and confit leg meat rolled in a pastry cigar. And chawanmushi comes with the savoury custard broken and floated in roasted scampi broth: delicate and rich, without any egginess.
But the execution can flag. The duck skin needs more rendering, and the accompanying parsnip purée would be sweeter and richer in season. Beef tongue is better: tender, nicely salty, charred over charcoal and cut with a vinegar-forward shiso chimichurri. A dish that suggests spending big for any of the steaks – all from premium producers, some dry-aged in-house – holds little risk.
For drinks, the wine list stays largely local while making coucou eyes at France, and even if there’s only one page of sake, the range in style and provenance is admirable, and it’s matched by good knowledge. Dessert is another highlight, where a sheet of mochi draped over coconut sorbet and served with diced mango, is the pick for texture and freshness.
In the early days at Kuro, the cracks in the concrete floor were painted gold, in a nod to the Japanese art of kintsugi, which aims to give new life to broken pottery by making it more beautiful than the original. A few months in, the gold has begun to fade, but there are glimpses to be found all throughout Kuro. The fun part is looking for them.