Mads Refslund

Coming Up

New Nordic Cuisine runs through Mads Refslund’s work, but so does a kitchen ethic built around shared responsibility. His language for service makes the point plainly: “We are not just "front of house" or "back of house," everyone is one house.” Read as trade practice, it means the line between stations matters less than the handoff, the timing, and the pressure the room puts on the team as a whole. At MR, where Mads Refslund worked as owner and chef until 2010, the focus was on structure and intent as much as flavor. That same directness carried into his later role as head chef at Acme in New York, where the format changed but the discipline did not. The throughline is a kitchen built on control, pace, and a clear sense of how to organize a service.

Where They Are Now

At Ilis, Mads Refslund serves as executive chef and as chef and founder, holding both the operational and creative side of the restaurant. The work is framed by opposing elements rather than a single style, with fire and ice used as the core terms for the cooking. Refslund has described that contrast directly: “I am in love with this contrast—fire and ice.” He has also said, “I love cooking with fire.” Taken together, those lines point to a kitchen language built around heat, restraint, and the friction between the two. The result is not softness for its own sake, but food shaped by edge, temperature, and control. That elemental approach gives the cooking a clear register: immediate, focused, and conscious of what happens when opposite forces are held in balance. At Ilis, the idea is not decoration. It is the frame.

Signature

Mads's signature dishes include clam flask.

In Their Words “We are not just "front of house" or "back of house," everyone is one house.” “I am in love with this contrast—fire and ice.”