Vegetables grown in Kyoto were served at a banquet Monday at the Vatican Museums to about 300 guests, including cardinals and ambassadors, to promote Japanese cuisine.

Dishes using local ingredients such as scallion, eggplant and pepper prepared by Yoji Satake, lead chef at the 300-year-old Kyoto restaurant Takeshigero, were served at the event organized by the Kyoto unit of the Japan Agricultural Cooperatives group.

The menu also included wagyu beef and Uji green tea. A tea ceremony featuring matcha was held before the banquet.

“We’ve brought traditional Kyoto vegetables, which were grown with great care, to promote the culture, agriculture and cuisine of Kyoto,” said Yasuhiro Nakagawa, the chairman of the group.

The group has previously hosted similar banquets featuring Kyoto vegetables at famous sites around the world, including the Palace of Versailles in the suburbs of Paris and the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul.

KEYWORDS food, Kyoto, Vatican