Chef Nobuo Fukuda

Chef Nobu began cooking at a very early age. His mother worked outside of the home, while his father (a journalist) cooked the family meals. Dad’s total lack of cooking skills prompted the young man’s interest in what would eventually become a life-long passion. His earliest food memory is tasting egg noodles for the first time in Japan. Noodles are still Fukuda’s go-to comfort food, as is evidenced in the supremely soothing Shinshu Mushi he serves at Sea Saw. For a taste of the chef’s favorite local cheap eats, head over to Da Vang in Downtown Phoenix. The pho comes highly recommended by a man who surely knows his noodles. Another childhood inspiration, found among the scattered influences that spark Fukuda’s imagination, is the rich and sweet-salty flavor of miso-marinated pork. This favorite dish spawned Sea Saw’s unusual miso-marinated Foie Gras.

It is Chef Fukuda’s aptitude for adopting and adapting multicultural influences that makes his food a particularly perfect match for the cooky wine-pairing philosophies of co-owner and noted restauranteur Peter Kasperski. Chef Fukuda’s uncanny ability to fuse Eastern and Western ingredients in suprising and strangely harmonious dishes makes his food a perfect counterpart to Kasperski’s break-all-the-rules aproach to selecting wines. The very notion of using authentic Japanese flavors to compliment primarily European-style wines is at the heart of Sea Saw’s clever izakaya menu, which Fukuda laughingly refers to as “Tapanese” (tapas-Japanese). In essence, the Fukuda-Kasperski partnership necessitates invention.