Kyoto gains new Michelin three-star
- Michelin added Kyoto ryokan restaurant Miyamaso to its three-star tier in the 2026 Kyoto Osaka guide, the region’s first new top-ranked entry since 2020. - The April 23 selection also promoted five restaurants to two stars, added 19 new one-stars, and named 12 new Bib Gourmand picks. - The 2026 guide now lists 479 venues across Kyoto and Osaka. (guide.michelin.com)
Michelin has given Kyoto a new three-star restaurant for the first time in six years: Miyamaso, a mountain ryokan in Hanase. (guide.michelin.com) The promotion was announced with the MICHELIN Guide Kyoto Osaka 2026 selection on April 23, 2026. Michelin said it was the first new three-star restaurant in Kyoto and Osaka since the 2020 edition. (guide.michelin.com) (news.michelin.co.jp) Miyamaso is run by chef Hisato Nakahigashi, whose cooking centers on satoyama ingredients such as wild mountain vegetables, river fish, mushrooms and game, many sourced nearby and some foraged by the chef himself. (michelin.com) The restaurant’s climb has been long and unusually steady. Michelin says Miyamaso earned one star in the first Kyoto-Osaka edition in 2010, two stars in 2011, and has held a Green Star since 2021 before reaching three stars in 2026. (michelin.com) (guide.michelin.com) The new guide did more than elevate one destination restaurant. Michelin promoted five restaurants to two stars — Doppo, Higashiyama Yoshihisa, Muromachi Yui and Tokuha Motonari in Kyoto, plus Teruya in Osaka. (guide.michelin.com) (news.michelin.co.jp) It also added 19 new one-star restaurants, with 12 in Kyoto and seven in Osaka, and 12 new Bib Gourmand selections, with three in Kyoto and nine in Osaka. Michelin said the 2026 guide now covers 479 restaurants across the two cities. (guide.michelin.com) The release coincides with a milestone for the guide itself. Michelin said 2026 marks 100 years since Michelin stars were introduced to identify outstanding cuisine. (michelin.com) Miyamaso’s setting also helps explain why the promotion stands out. The inn says its history dates to 1892 in Kyoto’s Hanase mountains, where it serves a “tsumikusa” style built around seasonal harvests from the surrounding landscape. (miyamasou.jp) For Kyoto, the headline is simple: the city’s top tier just expanded again, and it did so with a restaurant Michelin says has spent more than a decade moving upward one step at a time. (guide.michelin.com)
