Aster by Joshua Paris

Although it was open for over a decade, I never managed to get to experience Paul Pairet's 3-Michelin starred Ultra Violet. Joshua Paris was the head chef at Ultra Violet and so I was excited to hear he would be opening his own restaurant in Shanghai. To be clear, this is not Ultra Violet 2.0 or any attempt to recreate that, and that's a good thing in my opinion.

The restaurant is located on the second floor of a new development on a side street at the end of Nanjing Road West on the border of Jing'An and Changning district. It can be hard to find especially as there isn't much else around at the moment, although there will be some additions very soon, both F&B venues and some residential units.

What you do get at Aster is very well executed fine dining food at prices that, while not cheap, certainly do not reach the dizzying heights of many other fancy restaurants in Shanghai.

The menu is fairly small and for me, that's a plus. There's nothing worse than being overwhelmed by endless choices and it also says to me that every dish will be put together with fresh ingredients. And I've heard that there will be frequent rotations to the menu so customers won't tire of the menu.

I will always gravitate to any beetroot dish, so the Beetroot Salad (98 RMB) was an easy choice, followed by the XL Drunken Pigeon (158 RMB), Black Cod with Fennel Salad and Bouillabaisse sauce (298 RMB) and the Poulet Farci (268 RMB).

Every dish was perfect, but the beetroot and the black cod were my personal favourites (that Bouillabaisse sauce is incredible). My dining companion finished with the Valhrona Chocolate Entremet (98 RMB) and I resisted ordering a dessert due to an expanding waistline and a cholesterol problem, but I could not stop picking at the remains of that dessert.

There is a bar section, so you can drop in for a cocktail or two without having to eat. We actually did precisely this the previous night, but everything looked so good we immediately booked ourselves in for dinner the following night. I recommend sitting at the chef's counter rather than the tables, which gives you a perfect view of all the food being meticulously prepared under the watchful eye of owner / chef Josh Paris.

Aster is currently open Wednesday to Sunday, only in the evenings. Bookings for dinner are essential, even in these early days, but if you just want to pop in for a drink, you should find some space available.

Address: 2/F, 150 Yongyuan Road, Jing'an District 静安区永源路150号2楼
Reservations: 15618828656