I went to the restaurant Kazan the other day, the name of which signals its Central Asian slant—a kazan is the wok-shaped cast-iron pan traditionally used to cook plov, making it the equivalent of a paella for paella. The lamp-lit restaurant is decked in a lot of the same décor as the myriad other places with similar menus and mid-range prices—intricate turquoise-and-white tile covering the support columns; clay jugs perched on wooden shelves along the walls—though the crystal globes hanging from the ceiling make it a touch more dazzling than your Shesh Beshes and Kish Mishes of the city (two democratic Moscow chains with Central Asian eats).
My object was not a steaming bowl of chashushuli or chakhokhbili (both succulent tomato-and-meat Georgian stews), unfortunately, but rather an interview with the brand chef of Restaurant Syndicate, the company that owns Kazan and one of the many restaurant conglomerates that dominate the Moscow dining scene. His name is Ilya Tyukov, and he is a smiling, hulking man with a crushing handshake and a warm, placid manner.
Given his title of brand chef and the administrative position that implies, I wasn’t sure what to expect of the conversation—whether it would be about food, the restaurant business, or what—and indeed, we ended up dwelling on an unexpected topic: the gastronomic wonders of Tashkent, that most romantic-sounding of Central Asian destinations. He regaled me with accounts of cottony light lamb cooked over portable burners at an impromptu market; of a central kitchen where they prepared one-and-a-half tons of plov every morning in a colossal kazan; of one man’s private home that doubles as an early-morning cafeteria for taxi drivers and all other comers, who file in at 5 a.m. for kebebs and lepyoshki (tandoori flatbread). I was quickly salivating. I’m salivating now just writing about it.
As for local affairs, Tyukov had less to say—though his comments did give shape to some insight on the current state of Moscow dining and on the reasons behind the current ascendency of corporate restaurant holdings in the city.
He described how the Syndicate’s straightforward pizzeria chain Chentrale is doing very well; how traditional is popular, and that that’s why neither the Syndicate nor other restaurant groups in the city do many extra-creative projects. Instead, they stick mostly to Italian, Japanese, Central Asian, and Russian cuisines, because that’s what’s in demand. It’s a business decision.
The following may seem like an obvious point, but it’s my impression that a significant number of renowned, lauded restaurants in the U.S. and Western Europe are the babies of specific people, with all the nuances and idiosyncrasies that come with being unique places invented by individuals. I’m thinking French Laundry, the Momofuku franchise, the Inn at Little Washington. So, at the beginning of the interview, I asked Tyukov whether he enjoys his role as brand chef, which he described as having more to do with organization and planning than cooking or running a specific restaurant, and he said “yes and no”. He said that, deep down, he would of course love to open his own restaurant, be able to run a kitchen and feed his friends and welcome the guests; but that it’s extremely difficult to pull off in Moscow if you’re on your own because of the enormous costs involved. Many of the most expensive and most luxurious restaurants in the city are run by conglomerates, whether it’s the Syndicate, Arkady Novikov’s group, or Andrei Dellos’s collection (Café Pushkin, Turandot, Shinok, etc.), and being part of a big company here inevitably results in more standardization. The chefs at restaurants in these holdings are responsible to their companies—their owners—and so they have to please people with known favorites (in Moscow, this means, at the moment, arugula salads, borscht, grilled salmon)—not satisfy their souls, or experiment to their heart’s content. One of the only Moscow chefs I know of cooking haute cuisine, Nicola Canuti, of the superb L’Albero, has a much greater degree of independence because he has financial backers but is not part of a restaurant cartel. He uses arugula more sparingly than most of Novikov’s places and changes the menu at his whim. At L’Albero, you can dine on fois gras with sangria sauce and a molecular gazpacho with tomato sorbet. And, as far as I know, his restaurant is quite popular. But he’s a lucky exception, it seems.
And so, the latest new project by the Syndicate, Tyukov told me, will be a renovated Pavilion, the fine-silvered dockhouse with French doors looking on Patriarch’s Pond, and the food will be Soviet. Yes, that’s right—Soviet fine dining. I asked him how that could possibly not be an oxymoron. He said the presentation of such nostalgic dishes as Herring in a Blanket (selyodka pod shuboi) and Chicken Kiev will be updated, given some pizzazz—but that the dishes will be traditional, as usual. They hope to attract tourists; they will have musical performances and other special events to up the ante still more. And perhaps such a combination will attract them. It’s too bad that it means local residents who appreciate dishes in which original thought is evident will simply have another place to cross off their lists.
