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Justin James

@chefjustinjames

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After 87 services, Aptos receives 1 Michelin ⭐️
Chef Patron:
@restaurant.aptos
@bar.cruz
@bar.mary_

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Thank you to everyone who has been involved with @restaurant.aptos and thank you for all the incredible messages today. A great win for restaurant who has only done 87 services in 159 days! by @chefjustinjames

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5 days ago

Restaurant Aptos is honoured to have received ONE MICHELIN STAR from the highly prestigious @michelinguide

When we opened the doors at Aptos just 160 days ago, I never imagined this would be possible. We have completed just 87 services.

Achieving a star this quickly takes an extraordinary team, and I am endlessly grateful to everyone at Aptos, along with the tradies, architects and artists who brought this building to life.

To our guests, past and future, thank you. And to my partner and my kids, who turn the bad days into good ones. I stepped into my first Michelin kitchen 18 years ago and have been learning in those rooms ever since. It’s in my DNA. To say that now as the owner of a five-month-old restaurant is a moment I will remember forever.

Thank you to Michelin and to South Australia for making this happen.

@michelinguide @southaustralia @satourismcommission

#restaurantaptos #justinjames #adelaidehills #michelinguideau #michelinstar27 taken in Stirling, South Australia by @chefjustinjames

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5 days ago

: A NEW STAR SHINES IN THE ADELAIDE HILLS OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA ⭐ @restaurant.aptos

Just five months after opening its doors, Restaurant Aptos by Justin James has been awarded a Michelin star at the first-ever Michelin Guide ceremony in South Australia.

Set inside a beautifully restored historic church dating back to 1878, Aptos welcomes just 14 guests per sitting for an immersive dining experience shaped by the richness of native Australian ingredients and the flavours of Oceania.

“When we opened the doors at Aptos just 159 days ago, I never imagined this would be possible. We have completed just 87 services. Achieving a star this quickly takes an extraordinary team, and I am endlessly grateful to everyone at Aptos, along with the tradies, architects and artists who brought this building to life.”

“To our guests, past and future, thank you. And to my partner and my kids, who turn the bad days into good ones. I stepped into my first Michelin kitchen 18 years ago and have been learning in those rooms ever since. It’s in my DNA. To say that now as the owner of a five-month-old restaurant is a moment I will remember forever. Thank you to Michelin and to South Australia for making this happen.”  - @chefjustinjames

Through a 16 course tasting menu featuring around 50 native ingredients, Justin James explores the land’s extraordinary diversity, follows the rhythm of the seasons and finds new ways to express each ingredient. A restaurant built around a clear vision, a deep respect for its produce and a desire to offer something truly distinctive.

Five months. One star. A remarkable milestone for Justin James and his diligent team. This is ust the beginning.

@chefjustinjames
@restaurant.aptos taken in Stirling, Adelaide Hills by @chefjustinjames

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6 days ago

Caroline, our Senior Associate, shoots almost every finished project we complete.

Not a trained photographer, Caroline fell into the love of photography after a trip overseas. Having been embedded in a project from the start, she already understands the intention behind every interior - what we were trying to achieve, and why.

Her approach comes back to the same questions each time: light, texture, how a space is meant to feel. Almost every client answers that last one the same way - calm, relaxed, like a retreat, something that changes how they live.

At Restaurant Aptos, the arched windows throw ethereal patterns of light through the space - these particular photos were taken at 6am. But Aptos is mostly experienced at night, so the photography had to capture that atmosphere too, working alongside Justin's food rather than around it. The outlook beyond the windows does a lot of that grounding work - the connection to the landscape outside is part of what makes the space feel the way it does. by @chefjustinjames

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6 days ago

🇦🇺Liderar un proyecto culinario en la actualidad es un acto de pura valentía.
Frente a un panorama de desafíos constantes y una presión que no da tregua, mantener las puertas abiertas exige mucho más que talento en los fogones. Ya no basta con ofrecer una propuesta culinaria excepcional; la verdadera clave para sostener un restaurante hoy reside en la resiliencia.

Fragmento de la entrevista del Chef Justin James para CHEFS TV

📲 Lee el nota completa: link en la bio

@chefjustinjames
@restaurant.aptos

#chefs #restaurante #gastronomia taken in Australia by @chefjustinjames

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13 days ago

🌍 𝟰 𝗖𝗵𝗲𝗳𝘀, 𝟰 𝗔𝗱𝗼𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗛𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀 🔪✨
Four culinary visionaries who found a home away from home and are rewriting the rules of their adopted territories.
By viewing local landscapes through their unique cultural lenses, they are redefining what it means to cook with a true sense of place.
➡️Swipe left to meet the chefs creating magic far from where they started

@chefjustinjames @restaurant.aptos
@tetsuro_tetxubarri @txispa_restaurant
@jim_ophorst @prurestaurant
@hcheneychef @sonsanddaughterssf

🇦🇺 𝗝𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻 𝗝𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘀 (𝗨𝗦𝗔 ➡ 𝗔𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗹𝗶𝗮)
In a restored Adelaide Hills church, built in 1878, American chef Justin James @chefjustinjames has built a 14-seat expedition through the native produce of an entire continent.

At @restaurant.aptos he is exploring the untamed terroir of his adopted home by looking directly to ancient indigenous knowledge.

By embracing native ingredients over imported luxury to build his flavor profiles, he explains: “If we want acidity, we use green ants”

🇪🇸 𝗧𝗲𝘁𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗼 𝗠𝗮𝗲𝗱𝗮 (𝗝𝗮𝗽𝗮𝗻 ➡️ 𝗦𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗻)
At Txispa @txispa_restaurant in the Basque Country, Japanese Chef Tetsuro Maeda @tetsuro_tetxubarri grows 90% of his own vegetables and applies his heritage to the magnificent local pantry.

Through the primitive power of fire, he merges Basque grilling traditions with Japanese techniques.

Describing how his culinary roots merge with the territory, he explains: “it is Japanese philosophy but with produce from here. If you focus only on the plate, you could be in Tokyo. But you are in Axpe”

🇹🇭 𝗝𝗶𝗺 𝗢𝗽𝗵𝗼𝗿𝘀𝘁 (𝗡𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗱𝘀 ➡️ 𝗧𝗵𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗱)
At PRU @prurestaurant in Phuket, Dutch-born Chef Jimmy Ophorst @jim_ophorst found deep culinary roots in the vibrant Thai landscape.

He sources 100% of his ingredients from within thue country and explores the unique produce Thailand can offer: “We came up with a vision. A hundred percent local. Everything we source comes from within Thailand”.

🇺🇸 𝗛𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝗖𝗵𝗲𝗻𝗲𝘆 (𝗨𝗞 ➡️ 𝗨𝗦𝗔)
At Sons & Daughters @sonsanddaughterssf in San Francisco, British Chef Harrison Cheney @hcheneychef interprets the vibrant local bounty throug by @chefjustinjames

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18 days ago

: ”Every dish at Aptos is an exploration of Australian produce, but it’s the theatrical presentation that has guests talking.”

“It’s a trip, a journey, an interactive adventure, all those things; and it doesn’t stop just because you are sitting down. The 14 diners per service move through three spaces over the course of the meal. As guests head upstairs to the Library, downstairs to the Kitchen and upstairs again to the Salon for dessert, it feels like a game of gastronomic Cluedo. Who killed the sommelier in the library with the crab claw?

Justin James did. The American-born chef who put Adelaide’s Botanic Gardens on the plate at the award-winning Botanic Restaurant from 2021 to 2024 has upped his ambition. Now he wants to put Australia on the table, by defining a new pantry for fine dining from beach, bush and desert.

But ambitious is too small a word for James, so let’s try harder. Driven? Relentless? Consumed? He’s across every aspect of the restaurant design and every touchpoint of service, tweaking, amplifying, transforming. He wants to stand out, and you don’t stand out by doing what everyone else is doing.”

🦘🇦🇺

This past weekend The Australian Financial Review published a big double piece in its weekend edition about Guide Michelin, which soon will announce its stars for the first time in Australian history, starting with the South Australia state, where Aptos - Australia’s wildest opening this year - is situated inside a 158-year old church in Stirling, Adelaide Hills.

The wildest in Australia but for sure also one of the most ambitious restaurant openings in the world in some time. Read much more about that online and in the weekend print edition of Australian Financial Review.

“This restaurant serves 16 courses – one of them is licking a log”

www.afr.com/life-and-luxury/food-and-wine/this-restaurant-serves-16-courses-one-of-them-is-licking-a-log-20260926-p60s5m

@chefjustinjames
@restaurant.aptos
@financialreview taken in Stirling, Adelaide Hills by @chefjustinjames

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22 days ago

Restaurant Aptos
📍147 Mount Barker Rd, Stirling, South Australia

Chef Justin James has created this restaurant inside a beautifully restored 1878 church.

A 16-course tasting menu built around around 50 Australian ingredients, with a clear philosophy, concept and vision behind every dish and gesture, and an obsessive attention to every single detail.

Acidity, umami, sweetness, saltiness, bitterness.

A truly unique experience. And when I say unique, I really mean it.

Justin James is a genius.

@chefjustinjames
@restaurant.aptos taken in Restaurant Aptos by @chefjustinjames

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24 days ago

“It all stems back to creating a place people would travel to. I want to bring people to Australia.” - @chefjustinjames

Peek inside the most ambitious restaurant in the country, in the September @salifepublications.

#restaurant #southaustralia #adelaidehills #food #michelin taken in Restaurant Aptos by @chefjustinjames

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a month ago

🇦🇺En el Restaurant Aptos, ubicado en Stirling, Australia del Sur el comensal no se enfrenta al estatismo tradicional del fine dining; en su lugar, es absorbido por el universo mental y la visión arquitectónica del chef Justin James. Con una trayectoria de más de dos décadas trabajando en restaurantes como: Eleven Madison Park, Noma, Blue Hill at Stone Barns y Vue de Monde, su primer proyecto en solitario como propietario-operador desmantela cualquier convención heredada.

El chef estadounidense Justin James ha decidido dar el paso más ambicioso de su carrera. Con una experiencia inmersiva de 16 tiempos a lo largo de varias salas y diseñada para grupos reducidos, Aptos desafía el automatismo del lujo contemporáneo. En Aptos no se usa acero. La refinada cubertería ha sido casi desterrada. El menú exige lamer, sorber y mancharse las manos, forzando una reconexión con el acto de alimentarse.

A través de una despensa que explora las profundidades de los ingredientes nativos australianos —desde hormigas verdes hasta semillas de acacia y el codiciado cangrejo marron—, la propuesta se aleja de los clichés estéticos.

En esta entrevista en exclusiva con el chef Justin James profundiza en los cimientos de su disciplina, la urgencia de romper con los moldes establecidos, el delicado respeto por el territorio ancestral y las razones por las cuales Australia se perfila como la próxima gran superpotencia culinaria del escenario internacional.

Aptos es una invitación a desacelerar, a reconectar con los sentidos. El Chef James, entienden que cocinar es, un acto de libertad. Desde los muros centenarios de la iglesia en Stirling hasta la vanguardia de una despensa ancestral que aún guarda secretos por revelar, el chef demuestra que la disrupción no surge del capricho, sino del dominio de las reglas y de la valentía necesaria para reescribirlas.

📲 Lee la entrevista completa: link en bio

@chefjustinjames
@restaurant.aptos

📷: Christopher Morrison - Henry Trumble - Aptos

#restaurante #chefs #gastronomia taken in Australia by @chefjustinjames

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a month ago

The final pieces fall into place.

This Thursday, Bar Cruz and Bar Mary open their doors, completing the Aptos trinity.

Three distinct experiences. One home. Bookings now open.

@bar.cruz @bar.mary_ by @chefjustinjames

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a month ago

Green ants. Wattleseed. Muntries. Sandalwood nuts. Lemon aspen.

After visiting @restaurant.aptos, you won’t just know their names. You’ll know what they taste like.

That sense of discovery runs through @chefjustinjames’ approach to native Australian ingredients, explored through a cuisine shaped by curiosity, place and flavour.

Slide to discover more. taken in Adelaide Hills Australia by @chefjustinjames

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2 months ago