Restaurateur
Saveliy Libkin

Children waited their parents and made this

Impressions of Portugal

Saturday in Coimbra

Lisbon

Beach in Coimbra

Beach in Figueira da Foz

More photoes

Recipe for July-August per two persons.

For tagliatelle: 3 yolks of home eggs and one more egg, flour, better Italian farina di grano tenero tipo 00

For sauce: three big cloves of garlic, 1 medium onion, 2 rather big tomatoes, it will be ideal to use beefsteak tomatos and 100 grams of best olive oil.

Knead a  stiff dough and leave it for 10-15 minutes. Then knead the dough again and roll it out thinly. Then  make from the dought noodles 5 mm wide. It is better to use pasta machine.

To heat garlic and onion in 80 grams of oil till the transparent condition at low heat within 10-12 minutes. Parboil tomatoes and peel them, then remove white parts of pulp. Chop peeled tomatoes, add them to deep stewing pan and stew more 10 minutes at medium heat. Salt. Then cool a little and grind in blender within 10-15 seconds. Then heat it again and add rest of oil and a few leaves of green basil.

Put pasta into boiling water with salt. Bring water to the boil and drain it in colander at once. Move pasta into deep stewing pan with sauce and heat within 20-30 seconds.

Sprinkle with olive oil when serve.

Tagliatelle with tomatoes

Continuation, the beginning you can find here:

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Pаrt 3
• Part 4
• Part  5

Today when I going by inflatable Chinese slides and dump from foam cardboard kiosks where was sub-quality skating-rink, I remember with some nostalgia building of hotel. But maybe in some time this branch of Arcadia at Deribasovskaya will also seem to be a nice and naïve pleasure, and maybe a culture-historical value.

Three weeks before opening of the restaurant it became absolutely exactly known that the nearest lavatory for guests and staff is in the court at Gavannaya Street, round the corner. Taking into account that previously these lavatories were intended for the sellers and loaders of greengrocer’s, any special conveniences weren’t intended. The very first guests could hardly hide their surprise when in reply to their question «Where?» the guard came to them and offered to escort them round the corner. Especially piquant it looked in winter. One should slip on a fur coat and to leave it to the guard at the entrance to greengrocery’s loading rump. Besides the lavatories have been locked, it was the condition of the shop. In a phrase, it was funny and sad when slim girl Sasha was escorted by Yura, it was the name of the first guard. Yura deal shortly, and taking into account the fact that he made some money on the side while he was a policeman, we often had to hear claims from the guests and to react. In the result Yura was fired, when it turned out that he made eyes at some guests on the way to lavatory. Sasha was the first who complained and he told it not to the restaurant staff but to her father. Father gave a call to his friends who had to do with the very police and as a result was a huge scandal. Though, when it turned out that the guard also from police all the claims assumed some «economic» shade. And it became the first truth at new restaurant.

Sasha dropped in often enough right after opening of the restaurant. And that scandal didn’t change her attitude towards the restaurant. Standard Caesar salad and espresso Sasha was brought almost immediately after the greeting. The menu of those times was rather strange from the today’s point of view. But those days also there were no more then 10 main meat courses. It was exactly Sasha who paid attention to misprints and different discords in that was written and what was brought. People said that she has graduated from language and literature department but it is not told on her lexicon much after a bottle of wine.  Almost all Sasha’s friends were newcomer businessmen or just well-heeled boys already those days. However Sasha’s image was at its best, as all her friends at least at the restaurant stayed at a distance even under the influence of alcohol. Sometimes it seemed that if Sasha even had a close friend he was hidden very carefully and they didn’t appear together in housetops.

Immediately after opening one more truth became clear, cooks are absent absolutely. And those people who called themselves a cook were able only to wash the dishes. Exactly tat days, during first days of operating we have met the first chef of the restaurant. It seemed that Maxim thinks rather adult and in principle the things that he cooked at our first meeting could be called a food. His wife worked with him at Steamship Company earlier also. So, some time later she came to the restaurant also. After Maxim who drank everything that flows and looked at everything that moves also not always remembered that the restaurant operate everyday. So the parting after the second absence from work was easy. And Maxim’s wife was sure that as soon as her husband leaves the restaurant he will drink and cheat her less or will stop at all. Right after Maxim Sergey Nikolevich came. He was a marine cook also. Sereja didn’t drink within two weeks after the employment. But during the first inventory it turned out that all bourbon which wasn’t eaten by the guests at the famous those days Steak Bourbon has been drunken by the chef together with cooks. And it was dismissal again. Maybe it was a special kind of time those days but the next cooks also worked without kick-up no more then two-three months. If we managed to put to rights the bar, then the alcohol in the kitchen has been drunken by the cooks before the dinner. One of the experimental chefs in the restaurant became one Valentin also. I worked as his deputy at the café Fontan in due time. In café, 12 years ago Valentin has been known by that during all the inventories he locked himself up with controller in his office and they opened the doors already when the staff left café. The next day I opened café with the help of reserve set of keys and everyone knew that on the eve Valentin had a difficult day, so they worked without chef. Valentin promised that he won’t drink, that if we will come to an agreement everything will be competently and without failures. His promise held till the first salary. The parting was no difficult as on the day of salary his old friend came to Valentin and it wasn’t a surprise for him when the nest day the guards didn’t allow him even to enter the restaurant.  Maybe only the sharpest moments stay in my mind but during the first year of restaurant’s operation a hard drinking was the main problem, especially for the kitchen staff.

Continuation, the beginning you can find here:

• Pаrt 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4

And the city continued to change. The clubs like Skazka, Love Café and others which were intended for 3-6 months of active business have been opened. New momentary interesting projects-mixes like restaurant-lounge-bar-casino-club-sauna-banquets-sushi have been opened. The word «fusion» became a strategy, a flag and best-seller at the same time.  Even communists masked as reformers asked about «this» during business lunch at executive committee cafés and bars. Business has flirted actively first with the most depressed population with the help of sushi and discount, then with first hereditary or newly celebrities with the help of word combination luxury limited edition on the dark green background and in gold-filled frame always.

Arcadia became a branch of Thailand gradually and in its cheapest version. Middle class traveled actively because many residents of Odessa didn’t correlate themselves either with first or with the second ones and respectively preferred to spend their money in that place where people did their best for them. Exactly on this background the short menu from 14-17 steaks and ten salads-snacks in the restaurant at Deribasovskaya street has perceived oddly enough and successful. That is why Steakhouse has celebrated its first successful five years in simulated-endangered half middle class society. Meanwhile the first waitress of the restaurant already have bought cars and stopped to pay attention on foreigners.

Mariana, the star of that time with a huge breast and managerial voice still tried to find a candidate for a position of husband-friend-sponsor. Casting has taken place constantly, but the first tasting in the overby hotel Spartak indicated that Mariana has more luck with short-term suitors.  One of them, Ruslan by name, constantly came to the restaurant with one-meter-long dark red roses and as if by chance has left them for Mariana after a dinner. Even if it was another shift, the flowers were handed over to her the next day and her heart melted a little under such a flower pressure.  In a month approximately Ruslan disappeared from the list of everyday guests and that fact has been seen as regularity. And in one more month Mariana declared that she will marry, quit and move to the capital. In a half a year Mariana came back to Odessa and came to the restaurant again, but the staff was recruited and she was offered a job in another project. Ruslan became the regular guest again but he didn’t spend money for flowers anymore. Sometimes, when he was drunk a little, he asked about Mariana but he was rather afraid of calling her.

Meanwhile Sofia Akopovna has opened small café for children at one of the most depressed regions of the city. She stopped to drop in at the restaurant and listen to the criticism regarding usage of different foreign additives. Raya has taken a walk at Deribasovskaya sometimes and at that always in the elongated dresses, so that shin will be covered almost to the top of the shoes.  When Raya walked over an accidental prey she put on special waxen-pale mask and her greeting became restrained kingly. Dress code wasn’t changed. One day Raya has been noticed in the restaurant with rather interesting southerner, maybe Italian, and that time on her face was noticed uncommon for Raya extensively self-satisfied smile, as if it was saying – life is a success. Then Raya also disappeared from Deribasovskaya for a few years and at the same time from the lips of all-seeing staff.

That time hotel Spartak situated on the opposite street from the restaurant still gave a treat to foreigners and sometimes to local residents by the rooms without hot water and grey not bleached sheets at a price 12-15$. I doubt someone tried to bleach them, and the salary at the state hotel didn’t consider such carefulness. The name was justified by every detail and nuance of the hotel. The cost of room didn’t include a girl. And taking into account the fact that passports were registered, not many ladies dared to show their documents. A guard could drop his eyes and don’t notice a lady for about the same amount but only late at night. The rooms could be checked; at least it was said by grown plump ladies at the reception who has specialized in post soviet hospitality. Other hotels at Deribasovskaya, Passage and Tsentralnya, were oddly alike by ladies, services and conditions. The entrance to Spartak was just opposite the restaurant and staff enjoyed very much watching who exactly and with whom entered the hotel.  It was more interesting in winter, as there were more local residents. Sometimes but very seldom, could be observed a few couples from the guests. But it could happen only if quantity of alcohol turned off inner cultural-social qualification.