Kuznia Smaku restaurant, a review following an unexpecrted visit.
Last Thursday night I had a sublime experience at the Kuznia Smaka Restaurant on the South Ealing Road. On an off-chance in rather too-grubby clothing from the garden I decided that I needed a civilized meal out. The South Ealing area does not have the gastronomic quality that it used to. Usually I limit myself to the Zayka Indian restaurant where I have experienced over twenty years of invariably excellent food and friendly and tolerant service. Last night I wanted something a little more rarefied and not-quite-as-exciting. Eating in the Kuznia Smaku was just like dinner at home when I was child (from my name you will have realized that although I am a born Englishman, I have Polish roots from my Polish parents who fought in the Allied Eighth Army North Africa and Italy during the Second World War (after being imprisoned by the Russians in the Lubjanka and in Siberia itself, etc., etc.)). It was re-assuring to discover that the quality avant-garde Polish cuisine that as available at the Kuznia Smaka indicates that Polish haute-cuisine has retained its integrity over the past thirty or forty years. The meal that I had consisted of (in English translation): a soup as a starter consisting of a clear broth/consomme with vermicelli, for the main course I had a chicken-loin-strip fritter (which is about the highest quality of chicken that you can obtain) with side dishes of new potatoes with dill and a cucumber/yogurt cucumber salad which is known “mizeria”. For desert I had a portion of Polsih cheesecake. With the meal I had two pints of Polish “Lech” beer a cup of white coffee and a glass of tap water (for my effervescent Vitamin C and Zinc tablet). This meal cost me £32.50. The last time that I had encountered the chicken-loin-strip-fritter in this form was in the dining room of the Hotel Warszawa in Warsaw in the 1970s. If memory serves the quality achieved by the Kuznia Smaka last night is the same as the Hotel Warszawa in its Communist heyday in the 1970s, and slightly better than how my late Mother made it. Mark Laskowski.
Mark Laskowski ● 3992d5 Comments