About Restaurant Shiro

A customer once asked: "Just what is the secret to the cooking?"

It starts with a tomato....

Repeat customers know that the Restaurant Shiro philosophy is to pair subtle, yet perfect sauces with only the best ingredients.

Hideo Yamashiro ("Shiro") was born in Okinawa, Japan where he learned the pleasures of a real, home grown, vine-ripened tomato. His passion for such subtleties brought him to Los Angeles where he eventually worked in such famous French kitchens as Ma Maison (under Wolfgang Puck) and Les Anges (he was sous-chef to Patrick Jamon). Shiro then became the head chef at one of the jewels of Southern California, Cafe Jacoulet in Pasadena.

Restaurant Shiro opened in 1986 where Shiro brought his passion for only the finest ingredients to the table, bringing rave reviews with the restaurant rated one of the top 15 Los Angeles restaurants (for food) by the Zagat Survey every single year since the year after it opened. In 1996, Zagat rated Restaurant Shiro the best establishment for food, putting the restaurant in such top honors company as Matsuhisa, Patina and L'Orangerie.

Following a similar path, Luis Alfonso Ortega Banuelos, affectionately known to all as "Mota" came to cooking through his mother in Valpariso, Mexico. As one of seven children, Mota learned to cook early and well, leading him to subscribe to Shiro's respect for ingredients and eventually becoming Shiro's sous chef and protege--and finally part owner and Chef de cuisine. Chef Mota continues the old school tradition of personally handpicking only the exceptional for inclusion in his dishes.

Early each morning, both Chef Mota and Chef Shiro (owner of Orris Restaurant in West Los Angeles) travel to the downtown Los Angeles fish market. If the fish isn't perfect, it isn't bought. Restaurants much more expensive, with much fancier presentations often just do not put such outstanding ingredients on the plate. It shows: Shiro customers become spoiled to the point that many will not order fish anywhere else.

Though primarily a seafood restaurant, there are other choices. You might often find a char-broiled chicken breast in an herb mustard sauce or sometimes absolutely stunning char-broiled lamb chops marinated in rosemary and garlic.

Many order the whole sizzling catfish served with a ponzu sauce and piles of cilantro. Restaurant critic Merril Shindler says:

Don't just be seduced by the catfish, however. Depending on availability, you might find tuna as sashimi with shaved parmesan and arugula, or minced raw with subtle flavorings and the offset of a bit of bitter watercress. Sample the glorious Chinese ravioli (that seem more like potstickers) filled with salmon mousse and shrimp with a smoked salmon sauce; perfectly cooked foie grois with poached pear and a port wine reduction sauce or absolutely marvelous sweetbreads with a shiitake mushroom sauce.

When impeccably fresh tuna is available, it is prepared just seared. Customers constantly ask when it will be available and the answer is: only when the tuna is perfect.

Desserts are also a delight. Chef Shiro's French training and knack for skillful saucing makes him a pastry chef to be reckoned with and Chef Mota carries on the tradition. Imagine baked figs and vanilla ice cream with an unaccountably delicious balsamic vinegar sauce or the best creme brulee you may ever have. Or the house specialty of sweet wonton skins with poached pears and raspberry sauce.

Once you have sampled the sheer joy of the exquisite ingredients, dining elsewhere may never be the same.

Even on your first visit you will be treated as friends. Come to Shiro's for the food, not for haughty service.