Restaurant: The Finnish Church
Location: Rotherhithe
By Boeing: 3602 miles
By Boris Bike: 7.7 miles
The last time I was in a church I was a teenager wearing a woggle, surreptitiously chomping my way through a double-decker during a sermon on the perils of gluttony. This was, of course, contraband confectionary, smuggled in under the nose of the rector, unwrapped under the cacophonous cover of a discordant organ. It still feels a little naughty, heretical even, to feast in a place of worship. At at the rear of the Finnish Church of London, in a beautiful building in rough-round-the-edges Rotherhithe, sipping coffee and peering down the aisle at the post modern altar, I felt like an imposter, soon to be ushered away under ecclesiastic duress. And yet on the table in front of me was a menu, and to my right a cafeteria counter loaded with buns and beverages. The Finnish, clearly, take a communal view of worship.
The eldest of Chelsea Pensioners may recall a time in England where the church was the fulcrum of village life, a place for people to greet and guffaw. Even by my scouting days that fun had given way to a fusty formality. But in Finland, if this corner of the cockney southbank is anything to go by, the church is still convivial and community spirited. And if you meet there why wouldn’t you eat there?
Being Scandinavian the church is a shrine to contemporary style, a temple to temporal trends. Clad in pine and enveloped in acres of glass it is bathed in early evening sunshine, the antithesis of the dark, dank, airless chancels that welcome English churchgoers. Rather than sombre, severe oak pews are Ikea style chairs.
I sat at a circular table among a cluster at the back of the room. My eye was drawn first to a large pine magazine rack that covered one wall. This offered everything the homesick Helsinkian may require, from a Finnish paper to catch up on the news from home, a parish pamphlet listing community events to an advert for a second hand lawnmower. The opposite half of the room was carpeted and strewn with fluffy toys and pop-up books. While fathers prayed, mothers chatted over coffee while their children played beside them. The whole spectrum of live, from the doting to the divine, under one spruce scented roof.
Feeling hungry I approached the counter. I was met a man as bemused as he was blonde who said “If we knew you were coming we’d have made more food.” I thought of replying that I hadn’t envisaged booking a church until my wedding day, but decided against it. There were no fresh options, be them sandwiches or Sami specials, and with the only heating utensil on site a modest microwave I resigned myself to the fact that I wasn’t about to tuck into a roast reindeer. But my spirits were lifted, and my groaning stomach somewhat appeased, by the offer of a Karelian Pie.
Whilst most of Finnish cuisine is shared with its Scandinavian neighbours this buttermilk rice pastry is a distinctive, if not delicious, culinary marker. I watched as a freezer bag was emptied and my main evening meal popped into the microwave until its two minute ping. This traditional, hearty dish consists of a dollop of savoury rice pudding on a pastry base, often finished, as it were, with an egg butter glaze.
The Fins are a nation that have historically been a pawn passed between their Scandinavian neighbours to the west and Russia to the East. This legacy can be seen in their food. In the cosmopolitan cities of the western seaboard the cuisine is Swedish and sophisticated while in eastern provinces, such as Karelia, the food is more humble and hearty, very much that of the Russian peasant.
After a delicious cinnamon bun had filled me up I browsed in the shop. Many of the staples, such as rye-bread and fish paste, are commonly seen across the region, but the branding was distinctively Finnish. For almost every product and every packet featured a Moomin, those magical, mysterious cartoon characters that are the country’s best known export. These shy and secretive forest dwelling creatures have expanded from their bucolic idyll to a global branded empire, and represented Finland to the world as a land that is mad as it is magical.
As I walked the rows and surveyed the shelves I saw their beaming smiles on crackers, crockery and, most perplexingly, lilos. Why anyone would go to a church several hundred miles from the sea to buy a themed inflatable is a question i have neither the time nor the inclination to wrestle with.
As I crunched into a biscuit in the shape of a Moomin in a Top Hat I was struck that Finland feels more distant than in reality it is. Like the strange, beguiling woodland land of sprites and spirits that the Moomins inhabit Finland feels like a mystical world, a world away. Its secrets seem deep and ancient, its image, like its interior, feels remote and impenetrable. That explains, perhaps, that while it it is clearly a magical land it has remained relatively unexplored in comparison with the rest of Scandinavia. It also goes some way to explain why my search for Finnish food led me to such a spiritual place.
