Cafe Bayan, Glasgow - Restaurants in Glasgow | s1play.com

A little taste of east and west

Review published on 08/06/2009 © Sunday Herald

In Spain, tapas are small appetisers that are served in bars to nibble with drinks before lunch and dinner. In Britain, tapas increasingly means a number of small dishes taken together to make a whole meal, in the spirit of Greek mezze or Chinese dim sum.

As the recession grips, the tapas formula has been seized on by restaurateurs as a way of making prices more approachable by downsizing main courses. You see this principle in operation at places such as the Italian Caffè in Glasgow’s Merchant City, where “secondi piatti” (main course) dishes like osso bucco have been miniaturised. At Cafe Bayan, a likeably laid-back neighbourhood eaterie with a diner-like atmosphere on the restaurant-packed Argyle Street, we now have a further extension of the concept: “Scottish and eastern European tapas”.

The Scottish-Russian theme isn’t totally arbitrary. As it turns out, Cafe Bayan was set up with funds from the old Scottish-USSR Society, that venerable institution which organised tours to Russia throughout the Cold War. Hence the mural of cosmonauts and Russian novelists, and the black-and-white photos of such Scottish literati as the poet Hugh MacDiarmid rubbing shoulders with Russian VIPs. These days, it fulfils a more ordinary function by being a good, cheap, easy place to meet up with friends over food.

The menu at Cafe Bayan is a bit odd; a bit random. The chef has a connection with Oloroso in Edinburgh, and this helps explain why many of the dishes have fine-dining connotations. Certainly, the Russian connection seems weak. Smoked salmon blini were served with smetana (Russian sour cream/yogurt) but they were more like thin, lacy French crepes than the small, yeasty, authentic items made with buckwheat flour.

True to Russian custom, Cafe Bayan serves good bread. Not the traditional sourdough rye, admittedly, but wheaten and white, all baked on the premises, at no extra charge. Eastern Europeans love their fungi. (A dear hunter-gatherer friend who forages for fungi complains that, while he welcomes with open arms Poles and fellow Europeans to Scotland in all walks of life and professions, he draws the line when they beat him to his favourite foraging spots.) The wild mushrooms that are served on Bayan’s own bread, dipped in egg and fried, then topped with poached egg, had a lot to commend them, and this same soft, doughy bread was also used to great effect in an exceptionally toothsome amaretto bread and butter pudding.

Some of our tapas were extremely good. A Russian pea and barley soup with broad beans, lardons of bacon and pea shoots was a delight, and a downright bargain at £3.25. Lamb shank, served as a crispy rissole with a potato and watercress mousseline and blue cheese and walnut salad, may sound implausible but, believe me, it was a pleasure to eat. A cullen skink torte, despite its prissy title, was quite inspired, essentially a fishy potato salad elevated by its fine-dining lemon caramel drizzle.

Breast of pigeon with rhubarb three ways (oh, how chefs love serving three takes on an ingredient or flavour) could have been a disaster but wasn’t. I’m lukewarm about pigeon. Its USP is that it’s cheap, healthy and wild, but so often it’s dry and tough. This bird was OK, but the rhubarb elements (a puree, a jelly and a sorbet) really did add something.

You can’t help wondering if some dishes have suffered in translation. The root-vegetable “mish-mash” with Shopska salad (the latter a Bulgarian dish) was a little odd: the vegetable bit resembled an omelette, which didn’t hugely go with the salad, a pretty typical Balkan combo of chopped cucumber, pepper, onions and tomatoes with feta-style white cheese. The confit chicken terrine with pistachios Zalivnaya (this term usually refers to fish in aspic) was too cold from the fridge, and solid. Even its tomato chutney and sunflower toast couldn’t warm it up. But the paprika cream potatoes, chunky glazed beets and nicely stir-fried fresh greens made up for that.

After the bread and butter pud, apple and thyme custard crumble and banana parfait felt like second-bests, but a dessert of thick chocolate goo served with a towering mocha foam on top left me feeling very well-disposed to Cafe Bayan.

PS: It’s obligatory to drink champagne here. £25 for Piper Heidsieck? It’s a steal.