Book Oyatte in Murray Hill if you like tasting menus with a strong vegetable point of view, and order the herbed green porridge if it appears on the menu. It was our favorite dish of the night, and we loved it so much that we ordered a second bowl during the same dinner. At a $210 tasting menu with small delicacies, seafood, meat and desserts, a repeat order tells you exactly where the kitchen is most persuasive.
Chef Hasung Lee’s restaurant at 125 East 39th Street also gives you a proper sense of occasion. Dinner starts in a darker, rustic Atelier downstairs, then moves to a lighter dining room upstairs. That change matters: the meal feels reset halfway through. Our table went from melon, small bites and caviar to scallop, Arctic char, that porridge, lamb, quail and two desserts that kept vegetables in play through the end.
Why Hasung Lee’s background matters here
Lee was born and raised in South Korea and moved to the United States in his early twenties. His career took him through Gramercy Tavern, where he began in 2014, and Geranium in Copenhagen, followed by a return to New York as chef de cuisine at Atomix. In 2021 he joined The French Laundry as a sous chef, spending two years there before focusing on his own restaurant. That path gives Oyatte a mix of New York, European and Californian fine dining.
That range of experience comes through in the cooking. Brown rice bran sourdough comes with Animal Farm butter; quail gets fermented barley hollandaise; the porridge brings herbs together with soy-preserved black truffle and black garlic gastrique. Lee draws on several cooking traditions while keeping the produce central.
Preservation is one of Oyatte’s main ideas, and seasonal produce from Crown Daisy Farm shaped the opening courses. Ferments and preserves came back throughout the meal. The soy-preserved truffle and preserved cucumber on our menu showed that clearly, while pumpkin, peppers, corn and squash kept the season easy to read.
Start downstairs in the Atelier
The downstairs room is the more enclosed, textured part of the night. Wood panels, burgundy seating, a patterned rug and low tables make it a good first stop before the main dining room. The design draws on an upstate New York cottage and farmhouse, with salvaged materials and mid-century lounge furniture.
Our Atelier menu began with Cavaillon melon, served as bright wedges over ice. It was a clean, simple start before the more composed small delicacies. Then came Garden Parsley Root Soup, Moo “Tarte Tatin,” Tuna on Toast and Baked Pinto Gold Potato. The opening tells you the restaurant’s priorities quickly: roots and fruit get as much attention as seafood.
Jonah Crab Donut finished that printed opening sequence. The vegetable focus does not mean a vegetarian dinner; tuna, crab and the later enhancement were part of our meal too.
We also had the eggplant and Kaviari Kristal caviar enhancement, with smoked eel mousse and California spot prawn. The combination gives you a good read on Oyatte’s style: vegetables, smoked fish, shellfish and caviar in one compact preparation.
Upstairs, a lighter dining room
Moving upstairs changes the mood in a useful way. Cream upholstery, round wooden tables, flowers and the herringbone floor replace the deeper colors and lounge furniture below. We loved the space. The two-room format gives the dinner a physical progression as well as a menu progression: the opening delicacies fit the Atelier, while the main composed courses feel right in the dining room.
A suspended clear-quartz installation connects the floors. Commissioned from Korean artist Bahk Seon Ghi, the five-foot work hangs through an opening between the levels, so it can be seen from both. It gives the move upstairs a focal point.
Scallop, Arctic char and the porridge to order
Massachusetts scallop with porcini and pumpkin
The upstairs menu opened with Massachusetts scallop, porcini mushroom and musquée de Provence pumpkin mousseline. The dish brought shellfish into the vegetable-led style set downstairs, and the mushroom and pumpkin made the seasonal direction clear.
Herbed green porridge
The herbed green porridge is the dish to plan around. On our menu, the accompaniments were soy-preserved Australian black truffle and black garlic gastrique. The truffle and gastrique gave the bowl a savory depth that made us want another spoonful.
It was our favorite dish of the evening. We ordered another portion later in the meal, even with more courses ahead. If you are booking Oyatte, this is our first ordering recommendation.
The porridge appeared as a supplement alongside the Arctic char option on our menu. Our table ordered both.
Grilled Arctic char and sourdough
The Arctic char came with Crown Daisy Farm napa cabbage and rice wine. The farm connection continued from the Atelier into the main courses, while rice wine tied the preparation to the fermented ingredients running through the meal.
Brown rice bran sourdough followed with Animal Farm butter. Bread had its own place in the progression. The crust and butter were worth pausing for between the more composed plates.
Lamb and quail at our table
The meat choices went in two different directions. Elysian Field Farm lamb came with garden lipstick pepper, saffron lentil salad and lamb cumin jus. Pepper, saffron and cumin gave the course a different register from the mushroom and pumpkin that opened dinner upstairs.
Wolfe Ranch quail “Char Siu” took another route. Its dark red glaze came with Oyatte dukkah, fermented barley hollandaise and preserved cucumber. The cucumber added another preserved vegetable, while the barley appeared in a sauce more often associated with butter and egg yolk.
Lamb and quail are alternatives on the menu, so we ordered one of each to try both.
Dessert keeps the garden in view
The first dessert was called Late Summer Salad: summer squash, grilled peach, Norwegian brown cheese and sourdough bread. It carried ingredients you might expect earlier in the meal into dessert, with fruit and vegetables still at the center.
Sweet Corn & Coffee followed, combining a Jimmy Red corn croustillant tart, sweet corn ice cream and coffee crème anglaise. Corn appeared in more than one form, while the coffee component gave the dessert its second named theme. The ice cream came topped with popcorn.
These desserts made sense after a meal that had already given so much space to roots, greens, cabbage, peppers and grains. The kitchen kept that thread going after the savory courses ended. Mignardises provided the final small bites.
Champagne, mature Meursault, Pomerol and Tokaji
Our wines included Chartogne-Taillet Hors Série Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs, Robert Ampeau & Fils Meursault 2000 and Château Nénin Pomerol 1998. Later came Royal Tokaji 5 Puttonyos Aszú 2018. The table covered Champagne, white Burgundy, Bordeaux and Hungary, with the two mature still wines bringing older vintages into the dinner. The Hors Série was chalky and saline, with preserved lemon, orchard fruit and toasted almond. The Meursault 2000 had turned creamy and mature, with baked apple, hazelnut, mushroom and a long, salty finish. The Nénin 1998 was smoky and firm, with plum, blackcurrant and tobacco, still holding its structure. The Tokaji was rich and honeyed, with apricot, quince and white peach kept bright by its acidity.
General manager Cécile Chastanet is also the sommelier and came to Oyatte from Per Se. Her list leans toward Champagne growers and European producers, and our bottles fit that focus.
How to book Oyatte
Oyatte is in Murray Hill at 125 East 39th Street. Book through the Oyatte website. Dinner moves between floors, so mention any access needs when you reserve.
The tasting menu was $210 per person, with the porridge a $40 supplement and the caviar preparation $45.
Next time, we would leave room for the full progression and pay close attention to the upstairs choices. The two rooms make it a full evening, and the menu rewards ordering across the options. But the clearest advice is simple: if the herbed green porridge is available, order it. We did, then ordered it again.
