A new Japanese restaurant has opened its doors on Lincoln Avenue in downtown Calistoga, and its chef-owner carries a resume that includes years at Masaharu Morimoto’s flagship Napa restaurant and stints at two Michelin-starred San Francisco kitchens. Five Senses, which opened a few weeks ago at 1227 Lincoln Ave., serves modern Japanese fare, including scratch-made ramen, sushi, and bento boxes, from a space built from the ground up by chef Spencer Conaty, who is 35 years old.
Conaty worked alongside Masaharu Morimoto and spent over four years at Morimoto’s Napa restaurant, eventually rising to become the No. 2 sushi chef there, according to The Napa Valley Register. He first heard that Morimoto was opening a sushi restaurant in Napa back in 2010, and that opportunity became a turning point in a career that had already taken him through Michelin-starred dining rooms. Morimoto Napa itself opened on Main Street in 2010 as the chef’s flagship West Coast restaurant and was widely credited with helping anchor downtown Napa’s riverfront culinary redevelopment, according to SFist.
From a Hard Childhood to Michelin Kitchens
Conaty, who was raised in Placerville, California, told the Register that cooking saved his life. He became legally emancipated at age 14, a milestone tied to the loss of both his parents to illness, which led him into a structured high school Regional Occupational Program for culinary arts, per Calistoga Currents. At that same age, he reportedly wrote down a goal of one day owning his own restaurant, making Five Senses roughly a 20-year milestone.
He went on to attend Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Sacramento and learned sushi preparation while working as a cook at Kobe Sushi and Fusion in Cameron Park, where he stayed for five years. From there his path included Michelin-starred San Francisco kitchens Saison, which holds three Michelin stars, and Atelier Crenn. He also trained under other Japanese chefs working in Northern California, and once made 6,000 pieces of nigiri for a Toyota event in Texas. Conaty has said ethnicity does not determine whether someone can be a sushi chef.
Winery Roots Before a Downtown Storefront
Before opening Five Senses, Conaty built his reputation as a winery chef, holding executive posts at Sequoia Grove Winery in St. Helena and Brian Arden in Calistoga. At Sequoia Grove, he created unconventional tasting bites such as a honey mustard pretzel crunch made with estate-grown dried mustard flowers and estate honey, according to Napa Valley Life Magazine — pairing programs that the outlet notes challenged traditional rules against serving aggressive flavors alongside Cabernet Sauvignon…