Another Ritual dinner last night, this time the venue was at the St. Joseph Art Academy location (where we also attended the California Caviar Co.’s caviar day event a couple months ago). The chef was Julien Royer from Singapore who has a 3-Michelin star restaurant, Odette, which is also on the Worlds 50 Best Restaurants list (currently #36). We saw a few familiar faces from previous events, but amazingly I also ran into an former co-worker from Monster Cable and we instantly recognized each other. We were seated in the main stage area.

The chef’s cuisine is French-Asian. The menu included localized versions of some of his signature dishes from Odette (e.g. using local dungeness crab, local fruits, santa barbara uni, etc.). I think my favorite dish was the egg dish (that presentation was fun with the dry ice, etc.), but the following two dishes, the abalone and the sablefish were both excellent as well. Wines were decent and always very interesting. It’s also interesting to speak to fellow diners seated next to us (although sitting next to a grad student from Stanford definitely made me feel old).

After dinner, we were ushered upstairs for after dinner drinks and dessert and a chance to thank the chef personally. Taking the stairs where the belltower was located, gave an opportunity to ring the bell (no doubt to the chagrin of the neighbros…sorry!). Another unique enjoyable dining experience. We’d love to try his restaurant if we’re ever in Singapore again.