The bustling streets of NYC can be overwhelming, but when you go with your eye on the prize, it almost feels natural to walk amongst the busy crowds. Navigating my way from the Stratford Station in Connecticut to Grand Central is uniform at this point. Knowing I have enough time to plan my route when I get into the city from the train makes the trip a little easier. I love the feeling of visiting the city in the fall. The air is crisper and doesn’t smell as much as urine as it does in the summer. This was truly a prime time for a girls night Michelin dinner!

So a little backstory as to why we dined at Oiji Mi. To start, this was my first ever Michelin star restaurant. I’ve been to a few Michelin guide recommended restaurants in Vancouver, BC before but never an actual star received restaurant so this was a treat! One of my best friends lives in the city and every time I visit, our day is usually surrounded with visiting food spots. My friend and I met when we both attended Johnson & Wales to earn our pastry degrees. since then both of us have remained and prospered in the industry and you can find her at the OG Levain location!

So a week out I said hey I want to go to a good restaurant since I’m free, so we started to plan a day to get together. As I’m going through a list of food spots I’ve been dying to try and figuring out my budget, I decided to look into some of the Michelin restaurants. I knew I wanted a tasting menu and seafood but definitely was a little too broke to do spots like eleven Madison park or Per Se, but knew there were some within budget. So we capped off at a tasting menu for $150. Upon further research I found Oiji Mi and let me tell you I love when restaurants not only tell you how much their tasting menu costs but also what is on it and I was like this is the one!

So let’s talk about the restaurant now. You know the restaurant means business and privacy when you open the door and they’ve got a curtain that you have to walk through. We were able to snag a reservation last minute thankfully. Pure luck for booking a week out. And I loved that they called me prior to not only confirm the reservation but also asked if we were celebrating anything and if there were any allergies. Walking in, they brought us to their main dining room and offered to hold our coats and bags for us so we didn’t feel like we didn’t have space. The interior felt very lily pad style to me. There were a bunch of greens and soft velvety pinks. It was comforting and elegant.

Our waiter was absolutely wonderful. Being a part of the industry, my friend brought the staff and container of levain cookies as a thank you for the hard work. You’ll have to keep reading to see how the kitchen thanked us in return! Starting off the dinner, we ordered the Melon fight milk for 2! Loved that it was the price of one cocktail to be shared to be honest since we were dropping so much on the tasting menu. My friend was in the washroom when it came out but I loved the presentation. They brought out two bowl like cups and pour the drink right in front of us and on a little plate were two skewers of melon pieces cut into flower pieces and could either be put in the drink or eaten separately. It was creamy from the yakult but also fizzy from the soju and slightly sweet from the melon. I could’ve ordered it like five more times, it was one of the best drinks I’ve ever had!

Melon fight milk for two $28

makgeolli, melon, soju, yakult, chilsung cider

Now to move on to the tasting menu. Starting with course #1, this was like a trio amuse bouche! Starting in the front was the beef tartare wrapped in pickled radish with celeriac and caviar. I really enjoyed the acidity from the radish with the creaminess of the beef and you know I’m a caviar girlie that was just the icing on the cake. Next was the gyeran-jjim, also known as Korean steamed egg. It was served with a shiitake broth, turnip and onion foam. I thought the onion foam was so cool and the flavor really came through. The egg was so soft and creamy and it warming and comforting. The last bite was a spotted prawn in a gochugaru vinaigrette with green apple pearls and yuja. I was a little nervous it was going to have a kick but the prawn was sweet and it balanced out with the tartness of the green apple. It was definitely a memorable first course and having the option of all three truly made it better!

– 1st Course –

SPOTTED PRAWN · 도화새우
gochugaru vinaigrette, green apple pearl, yuja

BEEF TARTARE · 육회
celeriac, pickled radish, caviar

GYERAN-JJIM · 계란찜
shiitake broth, turnip , onion foam

Course 2 was an exciting one! This is where you essentially get to create your own dining experience and choose between different menu items for the rest of the courses! We had the choice between the scallop, amber jack hwe and the spicy bbq squid. Both of us are huge scallop fans so we both ordered it! The scallop was pan seared in truffle brown butter and served with a bean sprout broth poured over table side. The scallop was cooked so perfectly and was warming with the broth. I wish I had more than one cause it was a dish that truly stuck out. Along with this course, remember how I said the kitchen thanked us in return? Our waiter brought out each of us a plate of the amber jack hwe as a thank you for the cookies. The amber jack was so fresh and smooth and it had a little kick with the sauce but balance out with the finger lime and the apple!

Onto course 3 which was my absolute favorite course! Which was actually really hard to pick since every single course I had was truly phenomenal. Okay so this courses options were between the Jook (black cod), Lobster Ramyun, or for an additional $35 supplement, the Oiji bowl which contained seaweed rice, ikura, oiji, spotted prawn and sea urchin. Since I’m not a sea urchin fan I went with the lobster ramyun since based on all my research of this restaurant before dining, everyone raved about it. My favorite took the additional charge and went with oiji bowl. And let me say that thing was packed. I had to give it a try myself and the flavors all balanced together where the sea urchin didn’t bother me but you could tell it was going to be filling. Let me tell you about my ramyun now. Cold sesame noodles with chili and cucumber topped with tender lobster meat. Sounds simple but holy crap it was executed beautifully. The flavor just popped out and it was almost addicting. I practically licked the bowl clean. If I go and sit at the bar to order a la carte, I’m ordering this specifically.

our next course was our final savory one, also known as the entree course. Each option had my mouth watering and it was definitely the hardest to choose from. Our options were Galbi, which is a Korean marinated short rib, sea bass with a truffle seafood broth and then for an additional charge there was a suckling pig, which sounded absolutely fantastic but the sea bass was truly calling my name. My friend ordered the galbi since she was craving some red meat.

GALBI · 갈비
chanterelle, pomme purée, jicama geotjori

Let’s start with the galbi. The meat was super super tender. Like you barely had to chew it was so good. Not pictured was a little pot of mashed potatoes but you can see her obsession with it in my instagram reel. The potatoes were smooth and creamy and overall the dish just danced together with flavors id love to get at any steakhouse. I honestly wish there was a little more meat cause I felt bad she gave me a whole piece to try.

SEA BASS · 농어
scallop, manila clam, truffle seafood broth

Let me tell you this dish also blew me away. They poured the broth table side to rehydrate the rice pieces underneath the fish. So the rice ended up being chewy but also had a little bit of crispiness to it. it was an explosion of different textures. And the broth was so lovely and flavorful. It was rich and had that umami that makes you salivate for more. My surprise came when I started searching for rice underneath the fish and found manila clams and scallops. The bowl felt almost never ending and filled me up. Like I kept eating because I felt like I couldn’t stop but definitely needed to stop. 100% recommend this dish.

And now to enter our final course, dessert. Everything we needed to tie this meal to a wonderful ending. We both chose something different to allow us to both try each others. I ordered the black sugar bingsu and my friend order the chappsal donuts. These desserts were truly something exciting!

CHAPSSAL DONUTS · 찹쌀 도넛
gruyère, raclette, sweet rice, crème fraîche ice cream

The donuts were so crisp on the outside and honestly you couldn’t even tell there was cheese inside of them. Now combining it with a creme fraiche ice cream it was such a beautiful blend of sweet and savory that like made your tastebuds so happy. Out of our two choices for dessert, this was my number one!

BLACK SUGAR BINGSU · 흑설탕 빙수
black sugar syrup, boba, black tea cream

This dessert option was a lot of fun and very creative. It was like an homage to bubble tea. While boba isn’t my favorite thing, I did like how fresh it was. It was warm, not overly chewy and flavorful with a slight bitterness from the tea. I really enjoyed the shaved ice with the black tea cream. the cream with the ice melts together in your mouth leaving a lovely ice cream texture and it was so smooth I was surprised!

And here we are, sad that the meal is over. How do you even conclude with words how phenomenal a meal you just had was. It was full of joy, balance, complexity and flavor. It took simple ingredients and turned it into something id never know how to recreate. The question is, Was this meal worth $150? It’s a no brainer this meal was more than that. It was an experience and I’d pay even more to have it again. A huge thank you to the staff and kitchen team behind this wonderful spot. They truly set the bar for how a Michelin star restaurant experience should make you feel. Ive recommended this spot to so many friends and fellow foodies since and hope they one day go to experience it as well!