C’est Ouf

Brothers Kenta and Kota Sunada, the duo behind the popular Shibuya café Cherry Pick Hills, have embarked on a new venture: C’est Ouf. The name, French slang for ‘crazy’ or ‘amazing’, perfectly captures the spirit of the place. In Tokyo, it takes the form of a standing bar serving inventive French-Japanese dishes. Located just below their café, the space revolves around a wonky U-shaped concrete bar where patrons sit and dine as the chefs take orders and serve from the centre.

We started the evening with pommes frites topped with mimolette cheese – double-fried for extra crispness, dusted not with salt but with nutty, savoury shavings of the bright orange cheese. The marinated salmon pie, one of their signature starters, is a flaky rectangular pastry topped with cream infused with shallots, dill and wasabi. Above that sits an impossibly tender layer of salmon finished with herbs and spice mix. It’s meant to be eaten by hand and savoured like sushi.

If you’re unsure where to begin, the C’est Ouf amuse plate is a safe bet: a rotating selection of appetisers not listed on the menu. During our visit, it featured fried snapper with aonori, ratatouille, spinach pie and marinated mushrooms, among others.

The squid ink and white truffle pasta is pure indulgence. Even the aroma of the ingredients is intoxicating; one bite feels almost recalibrating for your senses. But the dish that best embodies C’est Ouf’s playful identity is the hamburg en croûte, a juicy beef patty wrapped in feuille de brick and served in a pool of rich red wine sauce. The crackle of the dough against the tender meat creates something entirely new – like a giant French dumpling.

With such an imaginative menu, it’s hard to go wrong here; every dish feels like a discovery. C’est Ouf is the kind of place you’ll want to return to – if only to eventually try everything.