★★★

Odo is not another one of those cloistered sushi counters, although at some point in one of its $200 tasting menus you do eat a few pieces of sushi, and they are exceptional. Hiroki Odo, one of the most skillful Japanese chefs in town, is giving the ancient tradition of kaiseki a modern, New York slant. He pries open the time-honored progression of courses to make space for inventions like a predessert cocktail shaken in front of you by the sommelier, Frank Cisneros, who picked up some of the more recondite skills of the Japanese cocktail bar when he worked in Tokyo. The drink he pours will probably be built around some fruit that is in season at the moment, and will be succeeded by something new at the end of the month, like the rest of the menu. Kaiseki in the United States has often come with a fetish for imported ingredients, but Mr. Odo works with local stuff, just as a kaiseki chef in Kyoto would. Most of the seafood is caught off the East Coast; ice cream is made with the lees from sake brewed in a converted Industry City warehouse in Brooklyn. When it’s time to leave, down a narrow hall and through a door that leads into an intimate, wood-clad bar, you’ll believe you’ve seen the future of Japanese cooking in New York.

17 West 20th Street (Fifth Avenue), Flatiron district; odo.nyc.