Restaurant Ark

It is unclear from talking to Jason and Matt just what happened to the steakhouse idea. “Eh, something happened, and we branched off in another direction,” is the line usually fed to journalists. In the grand scheme of things, it probably does not really matter. Copenhagen has its fair share of steakhouses. What is much more interesting to uncover is how two meat lovers from Australia managed to revolutionize the Copenhagen dining scene with a vegan fine dining concept.

To do that, we must travel back in time. To the beginning of 2020 when ARK branched out as a natural extension of Jason and Matt’s original vegan venture named Souls. Souls, at the time, was arguably already Copenhagen’s best casual and most successful vegan dining experience. Yeswefood.com sat down for a talk with co-founder Matt and creative director Jenia to ask the pressing question: Why change a winning formula?

Re-inventing vegan food - Breaking away from the plant-based label

“We just wanted to make something different,” explains Matt. “Whether we originally intended to or not, we have always been ahead of the vegan game. We were doing pretty good with Souls. We were turning away 60-70 people some days. We know we can cook better food, we thought to ourselves. We have some good chefs. Let us do something completely different.”

“Today, vegan food is either burgers or Angelika,” he elaborates. “Angelika (Geranium’s plant-based concept) is the only real competitor from a fine dining perspective, but the things we do are entirely different. Their food is very clean and vegetable based. We cook food that taste like meat! Mushrooms, umami, grilled flavors and so on. We cook vegan food for meat lovers. We want to show them that hey, you can eat vegan once or twice a week and it tastes great!”

“Essentially, we want to break away from the plant-based label,” Jenia interjects. “We want to normalize the experience and make it about food. Not labels. We do not target vegans already in the know. This is about changing mindsets. We are trying to offer dishes that do not taste like your typical vegan dish. Something more exciting than anything else you can get around town.”

It seems a reasonable gamble in the hindsight of success, but the decision was a massive leap of faith for the boys from Australia, and not an easy one at that. Taking a successful concept and turning it completely upside down – for the sake of people not in the original target group. It was a gamble, indeed, but by God did it work! Within weeks, their idea of upscaling vegan food and making it about flavor, not veganism, struck a nerve with the Copenhagen dining community. And they quickly embraced vegans, vegetarians and carnivores alike.

“We evolved into a respected part of the food scene,” they state proudly. “Chefs eat here now. When we were essentially a burger place and served traditional vegan fare, we knew it was good for vegans, but that was it. We were not respected by chefs and that is fair enough. Now we are doing something that nobody else is doing and it is getting a lot of attention and respect from the industry.”

The respect of which they speak stems not only from a change in attitude, but also from incredible flavors achieved with their new concept. The cooking style at ARK is a trademark mix of traditional vegan ingredients treated in reimagined ways coupled with ingredients and techniques entirely new to the realm of vegan cooking. All to create a completely new style of cooking. “I love working with nuts and seeds, for example,” chef Brett Lavender clarifies. “It is so very vegan. Yet, we work with them in new and very different ways. Ways I cannot even reveal, to create new textures and flavors. We do a lot of groundbreaking stuff, but I also like traditional, Japanese ingredients and techniques. It is my thing. Usually, everybody goes the French way. To me, French cooking is dirty cooking. They use so much butter in ways totally uncalled for. The Japanese way is much cleaner. You get a lot of flavor out of simple ingredients and simple procedures. It is a more refined way.”

Take, as an example of their new signature style and flavor profile, the relatively unknown lion’s mane mushroom which has become a staple at ARK. It is a mushroom so unique, treated so uniquely, that the yakitori version served here looks, feels, smells, and tastes exactly like meat. So close is the resemblance that it famously had respected food writer and self-professed carnivore Svend Rasmussen from Berlingske not missing meat for a second. “When he wrote that,” Matt laughs, “I was more than a little pleased. Then we knew, we were doing something right.”

“But in a way, it makes sense, I guess,” he elaborates: “It is treated exactly like meat. They massage it. They massage the mushroom! Like it was Kobe beef. They massage it with oil and herbs. And even I was like ‘why are you massaging the mushroom?’ – I guess now I know. It just adds a completely different taste and texture. We do things differently and it just works.”

And it is these words that more than any, perfectly echo the enigma that is Restaurant ARK. ARK is indeed different. In their dishes, in their approaches and even in their mission. A mission which, to them, is less about spreading the gospel of vegan dining than it is about creating a perfect experience. “People should come to ARK simply to eat great food,” Jenia underlines. “Some come here for the added bonus of it being vegan and sustainable. That is absolutely perfect but not pivotal. First and foremost, ARK should be about enjoying a good meal! The fact that it is plant-based is secondary.”

“I’m a meat-lover myself,” the rationale continues. For someone to eat a sustainable, plant-based meal from natural ingredients and not miss the meat is a huge deal for me! For people to not label our food as vegan but simply enjoy it is exactly what we strive for.” And in saying so, he taps again into the essence of ARK. Labels and boxes are not necessarily needed here. Jason and Matt have their principles, for sure. Principles of utmost importance to them. Unlike many of their peers, however, they are not overly vocal or preachy about them. One principle is that of plant-based food, another, and equally important, is the buzzword of the year; sustainability.

Restaurant ark - A new level of sustainability

“Sustainability is very important to us. Luckily, simply by serving good food, we can achieve a lot on our end. We can charge a slightly higher price and spend more effort creating a sustainable experience,” says Matt, admitting between the lines that being sustainable is a more costly choice for restaurateurs.

“We are not perfect, but we try our best to inspire through our actions,” he elaborates: “It is a learning process for us, and we constantly grow wiser. We buy local whenever possible. Our amazing mushrooms are from Funga Farm, and a lot of produce comes from Nabo Farm. They are just down the road and deliver by bike, so that is one less thing to worry about. Not much of what we serve here is produced more than a two-hour drive away.”

“Even spirits for our cocktails, we buy locally. Another guy just down the street makes them. Everybody else buys them in bottles. We buy ten liters containers to reduce waste. We empty them and take them back for a refill. We do not even worry about recycling glass. But it goes further than that, our plates, for example, were made here and not shipped in. Again, it costs a bit more, but there is a bigger picture to consider. Let us suck it up now, we figure, and hopefully make it back later.”

It is when focus of the conversation flows naturally from the sustainability of food and spirits to dinnerware and interior that it becomes evident to the listener. Evident just how much of a difference can be made by two young men working under the assumption that it is better to try your best and be imperfect than to be perfect from the start.

Imperfect, as they claim to be, sustainability is everywhere at ARK: The lamps are made from seaweed and recycled paper waste. The chairs of eco-certified oak from sustainable forests. The wooden floor beams come from a forest on Funen, an hour’s drive away. The wooden stools scattered throughout the restaurant are upcycled from the big, beautiful beams that made up the old floor of the restaurant. “Instead of throwing them away, we cut them up and repurposed them for seats,” Matt finishes. “It seemed the right thing to do. Again, our approach might cost more, but we must do as we preach and go all the way in.”

If it does indeed cost more to be sustainable, it is certainly not echoed in the price of the experience. An innovative, local, sustainable and constantly evolving 7 course tasting menu costs DKK 495 at ARK and that seems an absolute bargain price to pay to be on the front line of the culinary revolution. And to be able to take a stand on sustainability with the charismatic duo who set out to create a steakhouse but ended up revolutionizing vegan fine dining. A duo who by no means seem done surprising the scene by reinventing vegan food.

What does the future hold for ARK, they ponder as the talk reaches a natural end. “Pizza,” says one – “Izakaya,” yells the other and suddenly ideas start bouncing off the wall. “As you can probably tell,” Matt grins after this has been going on for a while, “we are not quite sure yet just where to go from here. There are so many ideas to try out and so many things that can be done. Maybe I will be izakaya? Maybe pizza? Basically, we want you to look at it like this: Anything you want, we will veganize it.