Getting a reservation at Noma, ranked the best restaurant in the world four out of the past five years, is next to impossible. Which is why Stephanie Robesky, who managed to score a tough table for two at the restaurant’s pop-up in Tokyo for her upcoming 39th birthday, didn’t want to turn hers down.
Except now she needs a date, and she’s crowdsourcing from the Internet. In a post on her blog, “Nerdgirl,†Robesky wrote last week, “Yes, there were 60,000 people who tried to get this reservation and I am lucky enough to have secured one for two. And, sadly, I don’t have a dining companion. So I decided since I’m single and dateless on what will be my 39th birthday that I would open up the opportunity for someone to take advantage of this crazy, once in a lifetime meal and find myself a date. Could it be you?â€
Robesky set forth a variety of criteria, such as the date must be a single male between the ages of 28 and 46, from the San Francisco area and able to cover the cost of his own flight and accommodations. The dinner, however, which retails for 64,700 yen, or $544 per person, will be paid for by Robesky. More than 60,000 people tried to get a coveted reservation, of which there are only a few spots during lunch and dinner for the six weeks the restaurant is visiting Tokyo from its home in Copenhagen.
“I thought this would be kind of fun. I would filter out people who have similar interests to mine because it ticks boxes. Someone who knows what Noma is; someone who’s interested in food,†Robesky told ABC News. “Somebody that’s spontaneous enough to just be like, ‘Hey I will go to another continent at the drop of a hat to do this.’ I felt like the people that would apply would be kind of interesting.â€
There have been over 100 applicants so far, many of whom disregarded Robesky’s requirements and applied from places as far as Taiwan and Luxembourg. The solicitation for applications even caught the attention of Noma’s head chef Rene Redzepi, who Tweeted about the search.
