Dadar Gulung (Rolled pancake) (Courtesy of Andrian Ishak)

Chef Andrian Ishak is definitely a name to reckon with. His culinary creations tease your senses and play with your mind, creating a dining experience that you will never forget.

Chef Andrian Ishak is probably the first person in Jakarta to have opened a restaurant that uses molecular cooking techniques.

A plate of food at his restaurant, Namaaz Dining, is not just an exceptional culinary work of art — it is playful and baffling. It certainly leaves food connoisseurs hungry for more.

Interestingly, he has no formal training in the field. He is a self-taught chef who excels in multi-sensory cooking.

Today, he may be on top of the game in this modernist cooking style, but Andrian confessed he never wanted to be in the culinary industry. He actually tried hard to stay away from it, exploring other art forms like music and painting.

However, it was his late father, also a chef, who had predicted that the kitchen was where Andrian’s heart was. Sure enough, he too realized that.

“I find creating culinary art the best way to express myself. It allows me to create elaborate pieces that involve more than just the five senses, but also emotion,” he said.

Being an artist at heart, for Andrian, the plate is his canvas. He skilfully applies his creativeness to present innovative and revolutionary dishes. In doing so, he raises the anticipation level of diners.

Molecular gastronomy, molecular cuisine or molecular cooking is about blending science and the culinary arts. Laboratory equipment is often borrowed from the science lab to create a dish.

Andrian, for instance, uses the rotary evaporator to make clear hot chocolate and even uses liquid nitrogen to freeze food.

“When we use techniques or equipment that usually belongs to a lab, we do it for a purpose. It is to create certain tastes and textures, among other things,” he explained.

“Cooking is also basically science. Many things happen during cooking. People don’t realize that they are practicing chemistry and physics on a daily basis in their own kitchen.”

Creating a visually attractive dish that tastes good, too, is no mean feat for chefs specializing in molecular cooking. It takes hours of dedication and patience to produce a knock-out dish. As Andrian admitted, “My experimenting with food can take more than eight hours.”

Andrian Ishak (Courtesy of Andrian Ishak)

What also sets this chef apart is his ability to use indigenous ingredients and even traditional techniques for his fascinating creations.

His very distinct abilities even caught the attention of internationally recognized British celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal. Heston is known as a culinary alchemist who boldly uses science in cooking to create a memorable experience for the diners at his restaurant, The Fat Duck in Bray, near London. The restaurant has won three Michelin stars.

“It is great to hear that chefs like Andrian are working in this rich and diverse area of cooking,” Heston said via email. “Multi-sensory cooking is forever evolving and it will be interesting to see how he develops this with indigenous ingredients and techniques.”   

Needless to say, Andrian humbly shies away from being compared to Heston. “Heston is definitely my greatest inspiration,” he remarked, noting that he had even dined at The Fat Duck.

Regarding the usage of indigenous ingredients, he said, “The choice to explore Indonesian food with the techniques that I use was very natural for me. Our culture is so rich and diverse, not to mention underexposed, which is why I chose Indonesian cuisine.”

In the beginning, he admitted he was apprehensive over whether his gamble of introducing this novel concept of cuisine would be well-received by diners. So he chose the name Namaaz for his restaurant, as it means prayer. “At that time I was relying mostly on a prayer, because that is all I had.”

Luckily for him, it was a big hit among guests. Andrian recalled how stumped they were when he served his first creation Es Campur, a spherical mixture of fruit with granita.

“I take great pleasure in introducing dishes that sometimes even our local customers have not encountered before,” he said.

Dining at his restaurant can take up to two to three hours and guests can enjoy 17 to 18 courses all served by the chef himself.

Urap Bali (Balinese salad)

The current season is themed “Cinema”, which also happens to be Andrian’s favorite.

“We are elevating the experience to be more than just ‘eating at a restaurant’. The experience will be just like watching a movie at a cinema,” he said, without giving away anything else.

However, after a little prodding, he talked about his latest creation, Papiong, inspired by South Sulawesi’s Tana Toraja food offering ritual. “I cannot give away any spoilers, but the genre of the dish is horror and very challenging to execute,” Andrian said.

Molecular cooking offers endless possibilities and the imaginative chef is not afraid to experiment with new ingredients that Indonesians are familiar with.

He showed his creativity when Danone AQUA recently introduced its newest product in the ready-to-drink tea segment — Caaya, with three variants: Jasmine, Vanilla Pandan and Toasted Rice.

Andrian readily introduced the tea’s flavors to invited diners at his restaurant.

“Using Caaya gave me the opportunity to take tea to a different level, where it is not used as merely a beverage, where the specific aromas give a different experience to the guests,” he said.

Regarding his experience so far, he said it had been a fun journey. “Striking a balance between the fun and the dining is the challenging part.”

At the end of the day, what really makes Andrian’s toil and sweat worthwhile, is when customers fly from different continents to experience dining at his Namaaz. “Delivering happiness on a daily basis” is what keeps this enterprising chef going.