At The Wynn Palace In Macau, Two Michelin-starred Chefs Had A Botanical Encounter

At Chef Tam’s Seasons—the resort’s two-Michelin-starred Cantonese restaurant, which is also listed on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants 2025 and World’s 50 Best Restaurants 2025—executive chef Tam Kwok Fung was joined by head chef Dai Jun from Beijing’s Lamdre, a two-Michelin-starred restaurant focusing on gourmet vegetarian dishes and another of Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants listers. Expectations were high when both chefs were also honoured with the Chef of the Year Award by the Black Pearl Restaurant Guide—and, safe to say, they did not disappoint.

Although Dai isn’t a vegetarian himself, his unexpected entry into plant-based cuisine still made him laugh when he recalls it. “It was purely by chance that I applied at Lamdre,” he said. “I didn’t realise it was vegetarian, but it just took off from there.” It has been 12 years since, and the chef continues to enjoy the challenge of creating plant-based dishes that are just as complex and expressive as any meat dish, by highlighting the nuanced flavours and textures of vegetables and plants.

At first glance, his choice of ingredients seemed simple—like his potato dish, for example. Each bite, however, revealed just how much thought and care went into unlocking its full potential. Here, he presented the potatoes in two ways. The first was a creamy potato mousse, blended with golden monk fruit from Guangxi and nine-year-old lily bulbs, then adorned with preserved bergamot and longan meat to bring out the potato’s natural sweetness. With the mousse, it allowed Dai to play up one of the potato’s many versatile qualities, emphasising its velvety softness.

The second portrayed the potato in a more rustic approach, featuring a Guizhou purple potato wrapped in salt and edible clay before roasting. Beneath its crispy exterior was a tender interior filled with sautéed pickled vegetables and yellow potatoes, celebrating the contrast in textures, while delivering a smokier, more savoury take on the modest tuber.

As for Tam, he found it thrilling to push the boundaries of his culinary expertise through this unique foray into a plant-based menu. “It’s definitely a challenge for me to cook vegan dishes, though I did make them when I worked in Thailand a long time ago,” the chef said. To return to this practice again felt like coming full circle. Today, his philosophy centres on nature’s seasonal offerings, and is more specifically inspired by the 24 solar terms of the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar—once utilised by farmers and far more precise in noting subtle shifts in seasons.

His most memorable creation was a dish called the ‘Five’ Roots—a colourful parade of radishes sourced from five provinces across China. Traditionally, radishes are prized for their health benefits, especially in winter. As the old Chinese saying goes, “Eat radish in winter, eat ginger in summer.” The variation in colour told the story of the different regions and their local climates, differing not only in hue but also in flavour, texture, and shape: yellow radish from Xinjiang, fruit carrot from Yunnan, red-skinned radish from Shandong, green radish from Henan, and ice cream radish from Tianjin. Each one is gently cooked in its own essence to uncover the depths of its individual character. Some are bright and peppery; others fragrant and sweet.

The two chefs also shared the spotlight with Domaine des Arômes, a small boutique winery in Ningxia, China, run by husband-and-wife team Peng Shuai and Sun Miao. Each bottle is crafted in-house, complete with a handwritten label for a personal touch. Together, this special occasion celebrated an interest in plant-based cuisine and Chinese wines that will likely gain momentum globally.