Matsushima is not the easiest restaurant to find. It lies on a quiet pedestrian alley with its name displayed so discreetly that you barely notice the stairs leading down to its unobtrusive door. And yet, over the 10 months since it opened, a growing number of people have been searching it out.

They are arriving not just from the immediate vicinity, the residential area around Yoyogi Uehara Station, but increasingly from across the city. Behind that inscrutable entrance, chef Yutaka Matsushima is serving up some great Chinese food, and word is starting to spread.

It's a tiny place, with just room for a couple of tables, plus a counter seating four in elbow-to-elbow intimacy. That is where to sit if you want to peer into the kitchen and watch Matsushima at work. He does it all solo, with his wife taking care of the service. The results are impressive and distinctively his own.