MINCE unveils Untitled, a mysterious first event of the year
An innovative seven-course meal full of surprise and novelty
Augusto Schwanz–The Tech
Augusto Schwanz–The Tech
★★★★☆
MINCE Untitled
Fine dining, $
Long Lounge (7-429)
Oct. 4, 2025
For their very first event of the academic year, MIT culinary group MINCE pulled out all the stops with an extremely ambitious pop-up, Untitled, shrouded in tasteful mystery and suspense. In an Instagram post advertising the event, a brief comment thread even revealed that a previous design was scrapped for revealing too much.
On the evening of Oct. 4, I walked into the Long Lounge in Building 7 filled with anticipation. I had never attended a MINCE event before, but I’d only heard good things, so I walked in with high expectations. I was seated at a table with very knowledgeable people, including a sophomore, an MEng student, and a linguistics Ph.D. student. I am grateful for their gracious company and found their comments on the dishes — some of which I incorporated into my own review — to be quite insightful.
The Long Lounge was quite elegantly set up, focused more on the intimate table arrangements rather than elaborate decorations, which I found appropriate for the black-tie style of the evening. After a brief introduction from MINCE staff, we quickly dug into the dishes of the night.
The first dish, the amuse-bouche, consisted of a seared tilapia served on a spoon with a strawberry-lime consommé in a shot glass with a salted rim. We were informed that we were intended to eat the tilapia and then take the consommé as a shooter. The presentation of this dish was creative and the process of eating even more so. The pairing of the fish and the shooter was perfect; the tilapia on its own, seasoned with amchoor, paprika, and gochugaru was slightly spicy. The consummé was slightly too sweet and acidic on its own, but the pairing of the two made for a delightfully engaging and balanced tasting experience.
Following the tilapia shooter was the pomelo shrimp dumpling, a large dumpling served in a delicious broth of coconut milk, fish sauce, bird’s eye chili, and Thai basil. While I thought the broth was a bit light on the coconut milk (it was almost entirely clear), the spiciness and seasoning were excellent and flavorful, which worked well with the dumpling. It was at this point that we were also served our first drink pairing, a pineapple coconut blend with pandan, yuzu, and sparkling water. The pineapple and coconut reminded me of a piña colada, with the pandan giving the drink a lovely green color and the yuzu providing a nice acidic flavor. The drink was very refreshing, which paired well with the spicy, flavorful broth of the dumpling.
Soon after came the third course, octopus crudo with watermelon and capers in a green mojo verde dressing and roasted tomato oil. An attentive reader may notice that the octopus crudo was originally intended to be the second dish in the menu above — not the third. Taste-wise, the freshness and slight crisp of the watermelon paired well with the soft, lightly seasoned octopus, but I was slightly disappointed by the ratio between the watermelon and octopus. Even after being very conservative with the amount of octopus I ate with each cube of watermelon, I found myself having multiple pieces of watermelon left over; alone, the watermelon and the green dressing just wasn’t my favorite. However, this is likely related to the change in course order, and the MINCE staff handled this change gracefully.
The fourth course was a miso-marinated cod ochazuke, a Japanese dish made of a fish filler served on top of rice with a tea-based broth. Instead of its traditional watery consistency, the dashi green leaf broth was blended to incorporate lots of air, creating a light and fluffy texture instead. The dish was also served tableside, with each plate of broth poured individually in front of us. I really enjoyed this course; the earthy flavors of the green tea broth and the lightness of the miso cod with radish scales on top was a nice contrast to the previous dishes.
With the ochazuke came the second drink pairing, a Japanese ambrosia. This was a fruity, sweet drink that had a thick mouthfeel (potentially from sugar cane juice?) and pear, along with a slightly acidic flavor that potentially came from the yuzu or pomello. I found this drink to sharply contrast the subtler flavors of the ochazuke, but I enjoyed the way that the two vastly different flavor profiles matched each other.
The main course of the evening was an elote risotto. This dish was particularly impressive in using all the parts of the corn: substituting it for rice, drying and grinding the husk down to make a “corn husk ash” seasoning to put on top, frying the silk as a crunch topping, and more. The dish also featured fresh fresno chiles, chive oil, cilantro-lime gel, and parmesan crisp to top it off. For me, this was one of the best dishes of the night due to its high level of creativity and ability to satisfy a craving for a more “traditional” and filling dish. I found the presentation a little basic, but the flavors more than made up for it.
The elote risotto also came with another drink, a hot hibiscus tea drink served with a taijin rim. This was the most interesting drink of the night, with the deep herbal flavor of the tea and the slight spicy and acidic kick from the taijin offsetting the heaviness of the creamy risotto. While the drink would have been better cold to be more refreshing following the risotto, I appreciated the creativity and uniqueness of the hot drink.
We moved on to the dessert courses, which contained my most anticipated dish, a black peppercorn white chocolate ganache. I was very curious about how far MINCE would go with the peppercorn. I soon found out that the ganache was well-balanced with the peppercorn, allowing the very finely ground spice to add an aroma to the ganache without introducing any spiciness. The ganache was served with candied lemons, a lemon and olive oil espuma sauce, and salted meringue.
At first, I was slightly confused by the presentation; there was a sand-like dish component under the ganache, as well as whole meringues to the side. They both had a similar texture and dryness that made me think that the component was also a meringue, but ground up. However, I found it to be saltier than the whole meringue, which caused my puzzlement. The espuma strongly tasted of olive oil, but it fit together with the sweet ganache and salty meringue.
The last dish of the night was a beetroot cake with a raspberry glaze, cardamom meringue, and white wine sabayon sauce, inspired by “the feeling of summer ending, foreseeing the holiday to come.” The cake itself was tasty, with a light earthiness, deep red color from the beetroot, and a nice level of sweetness. However, I found the glaze had solidified quite a lot, leaving a thick, somewhat chewy layer on top of the cake that I did not particularly care for. The wine sauce was a somewhat foamy, not too sweet addition to the cake that I enjoyed a lot.
The beetroot cake also came with the last drink pairing of the evening, a cold brew with grapefruit that was intended to be a digestif: a refreshing, uplifting way to conclude such a long evening. While I questioned the idea of having caffeine at eight o’clock at night, I appreciated the spirit of the drink, not dissimilar to a post-meal espresso or cup of coffee. I also found that the digestif actually helped with not feeling so full after a seven-course menu. Overall, the cold brew was a positive addition to the menu.
As a whole, I greatly enjoyed the event. MINCE was largely successful in achieving their goal of an “interactive” event experience through dishes such as the tilapia with strawberry-lime shooter and the foamy tableside ochazuke. While the octopus crudo fell short, MINCE handled any challenges with a type of grace that befitted the event they were holding. For $20, MINCE truly offered the MIT community an amazing introduction into the world of fine dining, and I would highly recommend the experience to anyone interested in the culinary group.