Restaurant in Tokyo, Japan
Serious French cooking, below top-tier prices.
Chef Shusaku Toba's contemporary French restaurant in Uehara holds a Michelin Plate, Tabelog Bronze, and a Black Pearl 1 Diamond — serious credentials at a ¥¥¥ price point that sits below Tokyo's top French tier. Booking is easy relative to comparable addresses, and the seasonal menu rotation means the timing of your visit genuinely matters. A strong call for food-focused travelers who want precision without the ¥¥¥¥ commitment.
Book sio if you want technically serious contemporary French cooking in Tokyo at a price point that sits one tier below the city's ¥¥¥¥ heavyweights. Chef Shusaku Toba's Uehara restaurant has earned a Michelin Plate (2025), a Tabelog Bronze Award with a 3.93 score, and a Black Pearl 1 Diamond — a consistent trio of credentials that together signal a kitchen operating above its price bracket. For food-focused travelers who want to eat well without committing to the full-scale spend of L'Effervescence or Sézanne, sio is the right call.
sio sits in Uehara, a residential pocket of Shibuya that doesn't advertise itself. The address — 1 Chome-35-3 Uehara , puts you in a neighbourhood of quiet streets and low-rise buildings rather than any obvious dining district, which tells you something about the kind of restaurant this is. You're not coming here for spectacle or a scene. The spatial proposition is intimate over theatrical: a small room where proximity to the kitchen is the point, and where the format rewards diners who are there to eat rather than to be seen.
The cuisine is French and contemporary, which in Tokyo's current cooking environment means a kitchen that treats French technique as a foundation rather than a constraint. The seasonal rotation at sio is the core reason to time your visit deliberately. Tokyo's restaurant seasons are genuine , spring produce from Kyushu, summer vegetables from Hokkaido, autumn mushrooms and citrus, winter root vegetables and game , and a kitchen like sio, operating at this level of technical precision, will restructure its menu around what the season is actually delivering. Right now, that means you should expect the kitchen to be working with whatever the current Japanese harvest cycle is offering, channelled through French preparation. The gap between visiting in February and visiting in May is not cosmetic; it's a different menu.
This seasonal attentiveness is also why repeat visits to sio carry more value than a single trip. The Opinionated About Dining ranking improved from #480 (2024) to #395 (2025) in Japan , a meaningful upward move in a list where most restaurants hold static or decline , which suggests the kitchen is not coasting. For the food traveler building a multi-city Japan itinerary alongside stops at HAJIME in Osaka, Gion Sasaki in Kyoto, or akordu in Nara, sio provides a different register: European technique applied to Japanese ingredients, rather than Japanese cuisine in its own idiom.
Practically, the hours shape how you should approach the booking. sio runs dinner Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday from 5 to 11 pm. On Saturday and Sunday it adds a lunch service from 12 to 3 pm. Wednesday is closed. If your Tokyo schedule gives you a weekend, the Saturday or Sunday lunch slot is the more composed way to experience the food , daylight, no post-evening fatigue, and a natural endpoint that leaves the afternoon free. Weekday dinner works well for solo diners or pairs who want the full evening format. Booking is rated Easy, meaning you are not fighting a months-long waitlist. For context, that's a real advantage over comparable Tokyo French addresses where reservations can require planning three to four months in advance.
The ¥¥¥ price tier positions sio as accessible relative to Tokyo's leading French tier. You are getting Michelin-recognised cooking at a spend level below what HOMMAGE or L'Effervescence will cost you. For a food traveler who wants to eat across multiple restaurants on a single Tokyo trip rather than anchor the budget to one three-star experience, sio earns its place in the rotation. It pairs logically with a sushi counter like Harutaka or an exploratory stop at Margotto e Baciare across different nights, rather than competing directly with either.
Google reviews sit at 4.2 from 384 ratings , a signal of consistent execution rather than occasional brilliance, which matters more for first-time visitors trying to calibrate expectations. You are not rolling the dice on a mercurial kitchen. For travelers whose Tokyo itinerary already includes broader Japan stops such as Goh in Fukuoka or 1000 in Yokohama, sio fits as the contemporary French node in what can become a genuinely varied eating trip. See our full Tokyo restaurants guide for broader context, and check our Tokyo hotels guide, bars guide, and experiences guide for the rest of your planning.
sio is located at 1 Chome-35-3 Uehara, Shibuya, Tokyo. Dinner service runs Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday from 5 to 11 pm. Saturday and Sunday offer both lunch (12–3 pm) and dinner (5–11 pm). The restaurant is closed on Wednesday. Price range is ¥¥¥. Booking difficulty is Easy. The Tabelog phone number on record is 03-6804-7607, though confirming current reservation policy directly before booking is advisable.
| Venue | Cuisine | Price | Booking Difficulty |
|---|---|---|---|
| sio | French, Contemporary | ¥¥¥ | Easy |
| Harutaka | Sushi | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown |
| L'Effervescence | French | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown |
| RyuGin | Kaiseki, Japanese | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown |
| HOMMAGE | Innovtive French, French | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown |
| Crony | Innovative, French | ¥¥¥¥ | Unknown |
What to weigh when choosing between sio and alternatives.
Yes. A contemporary French tasting menu format like sio's suits solo diners well — the pacing is set by the kitchen, so there's no awkward ordering dynamic. Uehara's low-key residential setting also makes it a more relaxed solo experience than a prestige Michelin room in central Tokyo. The ¥¥¥ price point keeps it financially sensible for a table of one.
No specific dietary policy is documented for sio. Standard practice at this level of contemporary French tasting menu restaurant in Japan is to ask about restrictions at the time of booking — contact sio directly via Tabelog (where the venue is listed with a 3.93 score) to confirm before you arrive. Don't assume flexibility; raise it proactively.
It works well for a low-key special occasion. The Michelin Plate and back-to-back OAD rankings (Top 395 in 2024, Top 480 in 2025) give it enough credibility to feel like an event, while the ¥¥¥ pricing and Uehara neighbourhood keep the atmosphere relaxed rather than intimidating. If you want a grander, more theatrical setting, L'Effervescence or RyuGin will deliver more ceremony.
Chef Shusaku Toba runs a contemporary French kitchen in a residential Shibuya neighbourhood — it's not a destination-district address, so factor in navigation time. Dinner runs Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday from 5 to 11 pm; Wednesday is closed. Saturday and Sunday offer both lunch and dinner, which is useful if you prefer an afternoon slot. Book via Tabelog, where sio holds a Bronze Award and a 3.93 score.
For French at a higher production level, L'Effervescence is the benchmark comparison. HOMMAGE and Crony are worth considering if you want contemporary cooking with a different register. Harutaka covers the omakase side of the city's tasting-menu scene. RyuGin is the go-to if you want Japanese technique at a similar prestige tier but prefer domestic ingredients over a French framework.
Lunch is only available Saturday and Sunday (12–3 pm), so it's the harder slot to access if you're visiting mid-week. Dinner runs four weeknights plus weekends, giving you more scheduling flexibility. Unless a weekend lunch specifically suits your itinerary, dinner is the more practical default — and evening service tends to allow a more leisurely pace at this format of restaurant.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
