"kaz yamamoto" news and stories

Phoenix's Wrigley Mansion, the stately residence built by chewing gum magnate William Wrigley in the late twenties, is experiencing some backlash for hosting an extreme dinner catered by renegade chef Kaz Yamamoto. The meal featured such questionable items as saguaro cactus, bichon frise and seal sushi.

Unfortunately not everybody out there is as open-minded as Chef Yamamoto. The Wrigley has fielded hundreds of phone calls from irrate individuals, some of whom have even threatened to burn the place down. Lighten up people. It's the 21st century, surely we should have a more embracing attitude toward a chef whose name may one day be uttered in the same breath as Escoffier.

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Chef Kazuki "Kaz" Yamamoto is on the cutting edge of cuisine. And by "cutting edge," what I mean is that he cooks rare, occasionally immoral, and sometimes outright illegal, foods for those who are willing to pay for them. Based out of Arizona, he travels to homes of rich and/or famous clients and plies them with previously untasted delicacies from his traveling "restaurant, known as "Le Menu". Because his client list includes government officials and gastronomes alike, Yamamoto says he has had few problems in the past obtaining locations, including restaurants, to hold his dinners. When Stephen Lemons, the Phoenix New Times food critic joined in a dinner, he sampled foods such as Saguaro cactus salad, made from the legally protected succulent; tenderloin of Bichon Frise, endangered pygmy owl, roasted and eaten whole, with entrails and bones intact; and nigiri-style seal sushi.

Other items that Yamamoto is famed for include chimpanzee stew (protected), grilled intestines of brown bear (poached from Yosemite), rhino genitals, gila monster, giraffe tongue, monkey tartare and a dozen variations on penguin meat.

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