Fusion restaurants are not all created equal. It’s difficult to perfect one cuisine, let alone too, and often when two very different cuisines are combined the food can taste a little strange. However, that’s certainly not the case at Copenhagen’s new Italian-Japanese restaurant, Levi. Here the chefs have combined flavours from two very different countries and created upmarket, elegant and innovative dishes for us all to enjoy.
Owners Jesper Boelskifte and Peter Trauboth have years of experience both as owners and consultants at countless well-known Copenhagen restaurants. Think Alchemist, Geranium, Umami and MASH. So, they really know what they’re doing and the menu reflects this. The name pays tribute to Italian Grappa (pomace brandy) producer, Romano Levi. This delicious Italian invention represents the kind of creative flair that the new restaurant wants to channel.
They make their own pasta at Levi and the menu is a mouthwatering mix of simple ingredients cooked with care to create dishes with complex flavours. You can expect dishes like red Mazara shrimp sashimi with cod and halibut alongside others like wagyu filet served with arancino and wasabi. You can also order oysters (a Copenhagen favourite) for 40 DKK a piece, which makes for the most delicious starter.
The dessert menu is equally tempting, featuring such bold flavour combinations as Amalfi lemon pie with buffalo ricotta. As you can see, they’ve thought very carefully about how the flavours will balance one another – zesty citrus with one of the creamiest ingredients on Earth, ricotta. Plus, there are plenty of tasty cocktails to choose from. The one that sounds most tempting to us is the Japanese Garden, which is a mix of Matsui gin, strawberry, sakura vermouth and pink pepper.
You’ll find this sleek new restaurant on the corner of Ny Østergade and Store Regnegade and you can read the menu on the website, where you can also book a table. We have a feeling that this place will be very popular. After all, this kind of fusion menu is really very new to Copenhagen and it seems like a great addition to the city’s foodie scene.