Restaurant in Kyoto, Japan
Hard to reach, worth the scramble.
A three-table yoshoku restaurant in Higashiyama with back-to-back Michelin Bib Gourmands (2024 and 2025) and a 4.5 Google rating. At the ¥¥ price point, KORISU delivers French-influenced home cooking — hamburger steak, fried shrimp, lamb, escargot — in a family-run room that feels nothing like the kaiseki circuit. Booking requires persistence: phone-only, frequently unanswered, no website.
Getting a table at KORISU is genuinely difficult. The restaurant has only three tables, the phone frequently goes unanswered, and there is no website to fall back on. If you are willing to put in the effort to secure a reservation at 101 Rokurocho in Higashiyama Ward, you will find one of Kyoto's most quietly accomplished yoshoku restaurants — Michelin Bib Gourmand recognised in both 2024 and 2025, and holding a 4.5 Google rating across 171 reviews. At the ¥¥ price point, it is among the most credible value propositions in a city where the kaiseki restaurants at ¥¥¥¥ command all the attention.
Yoshoku is Japan's tradition of Western-influenced cooking — French and continental dishes reinterpreted through a Japanese kitchen sensibility, refined over generations. KORISU is a family operation: a mother and two daughters run the room in white smocks, and the hospitality is domestic in the leading sense. This is not a performance of warmth; it reads as the real thing. The portions are generous, the cooking is consistent enough to have earned back-to-back Bib Gourmands, and the dishes , hamburger steak, fried shrimp, escargot, lamb , are built around flavours that reward rather than challenge.
The wine angle is worth flagging for food and wine enthusiasts. The Bib Gourmand notes specifically that escargot and lamb pair well with wine, which suggests the kitchen is thinking about the relationship between the food and the glass. At a ¥¥ price point, you are unlikely to encounter a deep wine list, but the pairing logic built into the menu itself , rich, wine-friendly proteins cooked in French tradition , means your bottle choices are largely self-directing. Bring a Burgundy or a northern Rhône red and you will not go wrong with the lamb. For those who want to explore Kyoto's wine scene more broadly, see our full Kyoto wineries guide.
Chef Iván Abril leads the kitchen , an unusual name for a Kyoto yoshoku restaurant, and a detail that adds an extra layer of cross-cultural interest to what is already a genre defined by its hybridity. No further biographical detail is available in the public record, so Pearl will not speculate, but the Michelin consistency across two consecutive years speaks to the kitchen's reliability.
KORISU is the right call for travellers who want something outside Kyoto's kaiseki circuit without dropping into tourist-trap territory. If you have already covered the high-end kaiseki end of the spectrum , Gion Sasaki, Hyotei, or Kikunoi Honten , KORISU offers a completely different register: casual, family-run, French-inflected, and priced to match. It is particularly well-suited to solo diners and pairs who want a real meal in a small room without the ceremony or the bill that come with Kyoto's kaiseki institutions.
It is less suited to groups. Three tables is a hard constraint, and nothing in the available record suggests private dining or flexibility for larger parties. If you are travelling with four or more people, you are better served looking at other options in our full Kyoto restaurants guide.
For food and wine travellers who enjoy the yoshoku genre, it is also worth comparing KORISU against the Osaka options: Yoshoku Izumi and Yoshokuya Fujiya offer useful benchmarks for what the category delivers at different price points and settings.
See the full comparison below.
| Venue | Price | Booking Difficulty | Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| KORISU | ¥¥ | Easy | — |
| Gion Sasaki | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown | — |
| cenci | ¥¥¥ | Unknown | — |
| Ifuki | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown | — |
| Kyokaiseki Kichisen | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown | — |
| SEN | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown | — |
Side-by-side comparison to help you decide where to book.
Book as far in advance as possible — weeks rather than days. With only three tables and a phone that frequently goes unanswered, persistence is the strategy: call repeatedly and accept that confirmation may take multiple attempts. There is no website or online booking option.
Three tables total means KORISU is not suited to large groups. A party of more than four risks taking up most of the dining room, which is worth considering before you ask. Smaller groups of two to three are the practical fit here.
The menu centres on yoshoku classics — hamburger steak, fried shrimp, escargot, and lamb — so guests with shellfish allergies or red meat restrictions will find options limited. The database does not confirm any formal dietary accommodation policy, so raise restrictions directly when you manage to reach someone by phone.
Yes, and more so than many Kyoto restaurants in this price range. The family-run, three-table format is intimate rather than formal, and the Bib Gourmand pricing at ¥¥ keeps a solo meal affordable. Solo diners should still book ahead — walk-in chances are slim given the size.
The hamburger steak and fried shrimp are the dishes the Michelin guides specifically call out as the flavours that built the restaurant's reputation. If you drink wine, the escargot and lamb are noted as good pairings. Stick to those four and you have covered the kitchen's core.
This is a neighbourhood yoshoku spot run by a mother and two daughters — the vibe is welcoming and unpretentious, not formal. Neat casual clothing is appropriate; there is no indication of a dress code and the hospitality style is explicitly described as making guests feel at home.
The hardest part is getting in: no website, three tables, and an unreliable phone line. Once you have a booking, expect generous portions of French-inflected yoshoku at ¥¥ pricing with two consecutive Michelin Bib Gourmand nods (2024 and 2025) behind it. It sits in Higashiyama Ward at 101 Rokurocho, so pair it with the neighbourhood rather than treating it as a standalone destination.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
