Restaurant: Tamada
Location: St John's Wood
By Boeing: 2091 miles
By Boris Bike: 2.3 miles
Though not enjoying the international profile and culinary legacy of France, Georgia is a country that takes food very seriously indeed. Renowned as the finest cuisine within the soviet orbit every dinner is celebrated as a feast. Having thrown off the shackles of communism the thriving cosmopolitan centres of Moscow and St Petersburg enjoy the trappings of wealth and a taste for the exquisite and the sophisticated. And the taste they have acquired is Georgian.
The Georgians don’t dine they feast and with an utter disregard for both duration and decorum a humble host is inadequate. To keep a feast alive requires not just hospitality but wit and wisdom. In Georgia this revered role is held by the Tamada, the Toast-master: in part a poet with a philosophers platitudes. It is he who orchestrates the evening as a conductor brings in the brass and stirs the strings to a glorious crescendo. And it is he who lends his name to a small, hidden restaurant in St Johns Wood.
In a quiet street, half-hidden behind an avenue of trees Tamada fulfils the role of a neighbourhood bistro rather than a tourist trap. It is refreshing to see an unusual cuisine on offer amongst the ubiquitous Curry Houses and Oriental eateries that pervade London’s leafy districts. In some ways Tamada is an oddity, neither serving convenience food nor in a convenient location. Such a restaurant relies on the quality of its food alone. I felt this was a good omen as i walked through the unassuming entrance into the relaxed, understated ambience of the restaurant.
Consisting merely of a handful of tables between a wide glass frontage and a decorative bar Tamada didn’t fit into either the ‘impact’ or the ‘themed’ categories that i have encountered on this journey. There was no attempt, through decor or design, to transport the diner to the country of origin. It was convivial and civilised. The walls were bare except for several paintings, mostly in a modern style, baring price tags. They were, a later enquiry attested, by Georgian painters.
It was clear after even the briefest glance at the menu that this was not typical of the cuisine I had seen elsewhere in Eastern Europe and Eurasia. The dishes were more subtle, complex and of a gourmet tradition. A region that has grown rich and portly with the profits of oil can afford to tantalise the tastebuds. And it is far more than a sense of regional solidarity that has made Georgian the haute cuisine of choice.
Before we ordered we enjoyed a glass of the house wine. When it was served the Cyrillic label caught the eye. This was a local wine, but unlike Cypriot Retsina, it was not cheaper or less refined than its Western European counterparts. Georgia is a proud and ancient wine making region. The taste and texture of the wine was rich with fruits and with a smooth finish redolent with tannins. It was complex and invigorating. We were in for a feast indeed.
I could not think of a greater contrast, either in restaurant or country, than Brazil and Georgia. And yet the traditional starter in both cultures is remarkably similar. Kachapuri is a griddled flat bread layered with cheese. It is traditionally served in platters at the beginning of the feast. It is meant to be shared, which perhaps explains why in consuming an entire plate I felt rather full. At a traditional Georgian feast a vast array of appetisers would be served, ranging from salads, stewed beans and baked mushrooms to terrines and soups.
Two of the distinctive flavours of Georgian cuisine are plums and walnuts, that form the basis for the many delicately flavoured stews that the country is famous for. While pork tends to dominate the Eastern European and Caucasus diet the Georgian menu includes a wide range of meats, including veal and lamb, and fish such as salmon and trout. This provides a more varied and complex menu, that compares more readily to France or Italy than to the Balkans or the Eastern Block.
I ordered the famous lamb stew Chaqapuli that is flavoured with red wine and plum sauce. It was the most delicately flavoured casserole I have ever tasted. Lighter than a goulash or bourginon but more flavoursome than a simple stew it combined a deep flavour with the freshness and texture of finely chopped vegetables and the sweetness of plum sauce. This was a very mature, sophisticated cuisine, perfected over centuries by very attuned palates used to eating well and often.
The legacy of the Soviet era is that the Russian region is generally viewed, in England at any rate, as austere and universal. Your average Brit, asked to describe any European country East of Poland in four words is likely to answer with Communism, Cabbage and Crap cars. There is, sadly, a lack of appreciation or knowledge of the ancient cultures and proud traditions of what now are liberated nations once more.
This uniformity was of course a Soviet policy and it will take some time for countries like Georgia to challenge these preconceptions and showcase their culture and cuisine to the wider world. If more people ate in Restaurants like Tamada and tasted Georgian cuisine they would be inclined to learn more.
