Rene Redzepi, co-owner of Copenhagen’s Noma has announced that he will be closing his award-winning restaurant on New Year's Eve, 2016 in favour of a farm-come-restaurant concept.
Noma, which currently holds the number three position in the top 50 of S.Pellegrino World’s Best Restaurant list, is widely considered to be one of the world’s most influential restaurants. If all goes to plan, Redzepi will reopen the restaurant on an auditorium-sized vacant lot in Copenhagen which will be complete with its own urban farm.
“It makes sense to do it here,” Redzepi told the New York Times. “It makes sense to have your own farm, as a restaurant of this calibre.”
From an outside perspective, one could question Redzepi’s decision to uproot the highly successful kitchen that he has led for the past 12 years, however he believes that the restaurant is ready for a dramatic change.
“It really, really, really, really makes me nervous,” says Redzepi about the new farm/restaurant concept. “I’m not afraid. But it does make me nervous.
“… Even though it has been successful, even though it has had media attention and all that… How do we progress?”
Redzepi says with the new venue will come with a menu overhaul – one which will have a more fervent focus on seasonality. In Autumn, dishes will feature wild game such as goose or moose and foraged ingredients such as mushrooms and forest berries; Winter will see the restaurant transform into a seafood restaurant due to the ice cold Danish waters; and Spring and Summer could effectively see Noma become a vegetarian restaurant as the farm turns green.
“Of course we could just keep continuing, just stay put and do what we do [at Noma]. But I genuinely think that we won’t progress.
“I have yet to meet anyone who thinks this is a stupid thing.”
Noma’s final service will be held on New Year’s Eve, 2016 with the new venue slated for a 2017 opening.
In July this year, Redzepi announced that he will be bringing Noma to Sydney for a 10 week period in early 2016. Noma Australia will seat just 50 people and will be located within the Anadara residential building of the new $6 billion Barangaroo precinct.
Chef Redzepi embarked on a similar adventure earlier this year, relocating Noma to Tokyo for five weeks. More than 60,000 people sought a booking at the Mandarin Oriental, where the pop-up seated 56 people for lunch and dinner, with each meal comprising 20 courses.