Next up in our Pioneers series, profiling the people who have been central to promoting Japanese food and drink in the UK, is Ichiro Kubota, a Michelin star-winning kaiseki chef who also one of the world’s greatest umami aficionados.

Heston loves it (and he’s got three), Claude Bosi loves it (and he’s got two), Nobu loves it (and he’s got more than almost anyone else). Michelin-starred chefs across the globe are raving about the taste sensations of umami, but there’s one who probably knows more about umami than most, and that’s Ichiro Kubota, kaiseki chef, umami expert and holder of a Michelin star as Executive Chef of London’s UMU.

Chef Kubota is trained in the fine art of kyo kaiseki cuisine, the most artistic and gracious of all kaiseki, which is itself the most refined cuisine in Japan. Kaiseki, for those who don’t know, was originally developed as a cuisine to accompany the tea ceremony. Then known as cha kaiseki (where cha means tea), it was a frugal meal that was designed to line the stomach, better preparing it for the bitter yet stimulating matcha, a kind of green tea, drunk in the ceremony. Today, kaiseki sits at the very top of the Japanese culinary hierarchy; this multi-course set dinner is luxurious yet austere, presenting the finest quality ingredients in the often the simplest of ways, accompanied by tableware and other items designed to heighten the sense of season evoked by the cuisine. To this, Chef Kubota adds a Kyoto accent, creating the highest edible expression of Japanese aesthetics, which is all fabulous simplicity and style. It’s also all about umami.

Chef Kubota trained at Osaka Imabashi Tsuruya, which is patronised by the Japanese imperial family. He then moved to Gion Hassun, run by his own father, where he worked for two years. In 2002, he made the decision to move to France, with a view to mastering cuisine other than traditional Japanese kaiseki, in order to take that knowledge and those techniques and incorporate them in his own interpretation of kaiseki. After working in Michelin-starred establishments in France, Chef Kubota came to the UK in January 2004 to work as Head Chef of UMU, the first ever kyo kaiseki restaurant in London, until July 2010. He quickly established himself as one of the leading experts in kaiseki in the UK, and particularly of the umami, the so-called fifth taste, that is used to such great effect in this traditional cuisine.

Scientifically speaking, umami is one of the five basic tastes, along with sweetness, sourness, saltiness and bitterness. There are receptor cells on our tongue and palate that are specifically attuned to umami; this is how we know that umami is a basic taste, kind of like a primary colour. Although science has only recently begun to explain the mysteries of the umami taste, people all over the world have been using it for years to enhance the flavour of their food. In Japan, in particular, a vast number of dishes use dashi, a simple stock made from two ingredients, kombu seaweed (a kind of dried kelp) and katsuobushi bonito flakes (flakes shared from dried fillets of bonito). When combined, these two ingredients just happen to become one of the world’s most umami-intense stocks. What that means is flavour intensity without any of the calories; there’s no butter, heavy cream or cheese to be found in the kaiseki kitchen. Which keeps the food light and the flavours lucid.

“Japanese cuisine must use dashi”, says Kubota. “So of course I use dashi when I prepared dishes for British diners. I also taught occasional cookery classes in the UK, where I take the opportunity to show how important water quality is in making dashi. Most importantly, umami can’t be drawn out properly in soft water; the water must be soft”. Communicating the importance of umami and dashi has been a passion of Chef Kubota. Fluent in English, he has shared his vast expertise on numerous occasions, including the Cheltenham Science Festival in 2005, when he shared the stage with Heston Blumenthal and Dr. Kathy Sykes. He has also attended IFE 2007 and 2009, where he demonstrated some simply sensational umami-rich dishes, the 2009 Umami Summit in London, where he took part in a panel discussion with chefs from some of Japan’s oldest and most respected kaiseki restaurants, the International Gourmet Summit, and many more events besides.

Today, knowledge of kaiseki, dashi and umami is growing in UK. For umami in particular, which Kubota has described as the “character of the ingredients”, chefs from diverse culinary backgrounds are examining how it can be introduced into their cooking, whilst food product developers are investigating its potential in reducing calories without sacrificing fullness of flavour and gustatory satisfaction. As Chef Kubota sees it, this increased awareness of umami in cooking amongst chefs based in the UK has been an important step.

His dream ten years ago? That kaiseki would one day get a coveted spot in the Oxford English Dictionary, and thereby officially enter the British lexicon. Well, it came true in 2007. The sixth edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary featured kaiseki for the first time, along with dashi. He hasn’t quite turned himself into a verb-phrase yet (perhaps because it’s harder to do a Kubota than a Delia?) but Kubota’s efforts in introducing a nation of burgeoning foodies to some of Japan’s best culinary secrets shouldn’t go unnoticed just because of that.

You can find out more about kaiseki, dashi and umami with our award-winning book, Dashi and Umami: the Heart of Japanese Cuisine.