Nobu ND Station Three - Wok: Hot Food Foxhole

Wok was my first hot station in the line of four - Wok, Grill, Tempura (Fry) and Omakase (Chef's Tasting). It easily became my favorite because of the fast turn over of these quickly sauteed dishes. Food meets ticket almost instantaneously.

Wok Station
Miso Soup
Aka Miso Soup
Clear Soup
Spicy Seafood Soup
Sea Bass Black Bean
Sea Bass Enoki
Sea Bass Dry Miso
Artic Char Inaniwa
Squid Pasta
Mushroom Salad
Shrimp & Lobster Salad
Lobster Wasabi Pepper
Lobster Black Bean
Creamy Spicy Crab
Whole Fish Special

A typical day on Wok starts by boiling several large bains of water for all the dashi-based soups and sauces. While these bubble away, the station is prepped - proteins fabricated, vegetables cut, and oils, sake, mirin, and soy sauce bottles refilled. Service on Wok requires a lot of movement and juggling of multiple tickets. There's no time to idle when you have two saute pans on the fire, a whole fish in the steamer, crab in the sally, and six miso soups about to boil over. But it's all in good fun and helps make the night go by quickly.

Another reason why I favored this station was due to the close kitchen camaraderie that was formed. Most stations are performed alone with little help or input from anyone else. The Wok and the Omakase stations work closely together to get food out. When Wok is slammed with a dozen different dishes, Omakase will pick up half the load. In return, when Omakase is rushing to plate for ten, Wok will jump right in. A good duo requires few words and performs what looks like a choreographed dance around each other to attend to the various foods. It's a relationship born of sweat, blood, stress and fire and is as close to a war buddy as I'll ever have.