Air
"At this sprawling space—an erstwhile clubhouse for civil servants—in Singapore’s leafy Dempsey enclave, chef Matthew Orlando (who used to pilot Copenhagen’s influential Amass) is continuing his mission to make circular cooking as natural as, well, breathing air. You’ll know this isn’t your typical restaurant from the moment you enter, up a sweeping walkway and past a thriving tropical garden commanded by Orlando’s business partner, Will Goldfarb of Bali’s Room4Dessert. In the dining room, funky tables hewn from the leftover cores of balau trees and chairs with arms twirled out of recycled Styrofoam play off exposed concrete pillars. Orlando’s tasty zero-waste approach to Southeast Asian ingredients includes dishes like a whole coral fish transformed into a rillette with lavash made from the puréed bones of the fish. Don’t miss the surprisingly fudgy Re-Incarnated Chocolate dessert whipped up with the by-products of common food processes—none of which are chocolate or cocoa beans. Upstairs, there’s a pickling and fermentation room, a cooking school, and a research lab where anyone can dabble in food experiments." - Audrey Phoon
