{"id":371501,"date":"2026-07-13T19:47:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T19:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/371501\/"},"modified":"2026-07-13T19:47:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T19:47:08","slug":"chef-yoshi-okai-opening-new-orleans-omakase-but-eyeing-austin-return","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/371501\/","title":{"rendered":"Chef Yoshi Okai opening New Orleans omakase but eyeing Austin return"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yoshi Okai stepped out of the Austin culinary spotlight when his lauded omakase restaurant, Otoko, closed in April<\/a> as part of a redevelopment that will turn the South Congress Hotel into the Standard Austin hotel. But Austinites will soon be able to get a taste of the Kyoto native’s artful creations; they’ll just need to jump on a plane to do so, at least in the near term.<\/p>\n

NOLA.com reported this week<\/a> that Okai will serve as executive\u00a0chef and partner at the forthcoming Kira Omakase (601 Tchoupitoulas St.) in the Warehouse District of the Crescent City. The omakase will function as its own micro-concept inside Kira, a high-end Mediterranean-Japanese restaurant that opened late in 2025 from restaurateur Billy Blatty.<\/p>\n

It sounds like diners can expect the same type of experience at Kira Omakase as they had for a decade at Otoko. The 12-seat sushi bar will serve a multicourse omakase for about $175, according to NOLA.com<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Okai confirmed the news with the American-Statesman, but it sounds like New Orleans shouldn’t make any claims on the Japanese chef. Okai told the American-Statesman via text that he plans to return to Austin in the fall and is looking for a space in town for a family-style izakaya that serves sushi.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Running Otoko was like my home, and I invited all my guests to my living room,” Okai told the American-Statesman via text when the restaurant announced its closure in April. “A lot of happiness, laughing. Also, (it was a) vibe like visiting Japan and (an) escape from reality. It felt like a miracle.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Yoshi Okai stepped out of the Austin culinary spotlight when his lauded omakase restaurant, Otoko, closed in April…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":371502,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-371501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371501"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371501\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/371502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=371501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=371501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}